Tag Archives: government

Informed Voters

Posted on July 12, 2024 | Leave a comment

Right out of college I was looking for work and taking short-term gigs in the process while living at home, in the middle of no-where. I traveled back to my alma mater’s stomping grounds for a round of interviews and got two offers.

One was to be head of PR at a major summer festival, a year-round job that paid very little and on the off-season, transitioned to planning for next season while doing administrative work. The other, for 75% more pay (still very little) would drop me into the deep end in the statewide political sphere, working as an analyist for the Speaker of the Assembly.

That was on a Friday. On Monday I became a policy wonk. At first I was filling in for the insurance committee analyst who was on maternity leave. I must have done OK because they only kept me on after Session, paying me to shift between information support and odd projects until a committee came up that I could staff.

The hirers, my former bosses all those years ago, saw something in me that I wasn’t able to see for myself. That I could dive into the deep end and swim, learning esoterica about whatever subject I was confronted with. Luckily or unluckily, the committee that came to me was governmental operations. I didn’t get to dive into a single subject, like banking, tourism or real property taxation.

No, not me. I had the largest committee without a complementary staff such as Ways and Means and Judiciary. I had 750 bills to shepherd, more than twice the normal committee, and this was pre-computer. We wrote out bill reports by hand for transcription by a clerical staff and tracked all bills by hand. I had to become an expert on legislative ethics, fire and safety codes, crime victims, non-professional business licensing (financial advisors, estheticians), civil and human rights, veterans’ affairs, cable television franchising, qualified immunity for police officers, land sales, let’s just say it was the “grab bag” committee.

I loved delving into policy. A couple of years into it, a lawyer from the bill drafting staff said, “no problems with this major piece of legislation you wrote, I have no changes. Did you know you’re the only analyst who writes your own bills?” Huh?

Last night Joe Biden gave a masterful press conference in which I learned a lot about the wars in both Ukraine and Gaza. Only someone with such history and policy/political expertise could have explained the intricacies of our negotiations on the world stage to achieve peace. If voters want to know a bit about what is needed to achieve successful diplomacy, they can’t ask for a better example.

I’ve my own theories about the student protests pre-graduation and think they may have been averted if they knew more about the historical situation. I do believe the U.S. is now on the right track using world pressure to get a cease-fire, prioritizing food and aid, and going through the steps for a two-state solution.

All the information I got back in the day came from nightly news and daily newspapers, including NYTimes, WaPo and local papers. One morning I got in to work super early, dropped my stack of papers by my desk and got to work immediately. My boss walked in and asked what I was doing. I told him I had too much work to spend time on the daily news. No, he said, that’s my job. Read the news, then get to work! Good lesson.

Now our information comes from so many and so few sources. Voters have to read a panoply of new sources to judge for themselves what is true. I always look at who wrote the article, what it’s published in, and what the writer/publication has to gain from spouting this point of view. If one only gets news from TikTok or Facebook, they have very limited information and it may be skewed misinformation or disinformation from un-trusted sources.

Being a good citizen isn’t easy. Last night I learned that we won’t grant 2,000 lb. bombs as part of our assistance packages because they cannot be used in urban environments as they cause unnecessary damage to innocent civilians. Who knew outside of current policy wonks and military officials about that granularity of information?

Next time your neighbor says there’s a pedophile ring coming in across the street from the barbershop, don’t accept it as gospel. Check it out. I get notices about public hearings on certain types of new businesses (after stopping an after-hours biker bar) and it turns out not to be the case. I’m not happy with what moved in, as it seems sketchy, but no-one’s ever there. I got it from the horse’s mouth, my barber, across the street. Get your news from reputable sources, read up on the issues, and vote! Dee

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Hello, is this Earth?

Posted on May 12, 2016 | 1 comment

So sorry, I thought I grew up here with family and friends and people who cared about each other.

Around seven this evening I heard a beeper that I thought was a neighbor’s phone with a busy signal. Then it went off. On again. I’ve seen both my neighbors this evening delivering them a package. This sound was loud and from our other building. I didn’t know how to find it so told staff about it.

All I was thinking was that it was an elderly person somewhere I never knew or met and they fell or had a heart attack and no-one would do anything. I took the dog out and asked immediately and staff had word out. Soon after the signal ended.

If a piercing sound was on for a long period of time with one of my neighbors I’d get in touch right away to be sure they’re OK. Here it sounded like my neighbors’ phone was left on the hook and I heard a mild beep.

That’s not what I do. I hope the person across the way is at the hospital and doing well. We lived out in the mountains and our neighbors were great. There were eight of us throughout the summer, fall, ski season and mud season and we had pot lucks every two months, host made the main course and others made sides and dessert. When an ambulance was called we were there and my tall husband helped a neighbor down the stairs to the ambulance.

Here most people are not so nice. I always grew up with the principle of being nice to everyone until they show they deserve otherwise, then ignore. Ignoring is worse than fighting back as they know they’re spineless turds and have no recourse. Bullies, a bete noire.

Here if you stay a millisecond at a traffic light you’ll have horns blaring behind you. No-one stops at a crosswalk even though it is state law. No-one picks up dog poop (I do). Forget about driving a car. Speed limit 50, everyone’s going 75.

In nine years I’ve driven my 2003 SUV 28K miles and that’s going across country twice. When I’ve heavy stuff to tote I drive to the grocery. Also because our feuding governments do not ever fix roads or sidewalks after harsh winters and road erosion.

Perhaps being out of jobs and not having paved streets and breaking car axles is part of the problem of people beeping at and being angry with people who just want to walk their old dog a few times per day, and clean up after her. Cheers! Dee

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The NedCil

Posted on July 18, 2015 | Leave a comment

I had a temp job at the Department of Education right after college. It was a six-week gig so I could find better employment.

What was I doing? Correcting applications for college scholarships. Name in boxes, address. These people couldn’t spell their names or fill in boxes so I had to do it for them. It was a ridiculous exercise for a $200/yr scholarship.

The effort allowed me to go to the state capitol to look for work. It was highly controlled. We were not allowed to use pens, only pencils. Ned controlled the pencils. Each one had “Ned” taped on it.

One day I had an interview with the speaker’s staff across the street and asked to take my breaks and lunch time to do so. No. Absolutely not.

Fifteen minutes before my interview I quit, left the building and never looked back. I got the job as an analyst and my life was changed. Today, my husband likes this story so much he calls my automated non-labeled pencils Ned-cils. Enjoy your weekend! Dee

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Making Things Happen

Posted on July 3, 2015 | 1 comment

Working for government is not a bad thing. It got me a start. Didn’t pay much and I got out of it a few years later.

What it did teach me is how people think. As a kid I was smart and emotional. Emotion has a small role in government when you want to write a piece of legislation that could have changed the world and a big company came in at the last minute and seized their day. Yes, after the agreement and subsequent denial that night I did lose my dinner in the lavatory. Two years of work down the drain.

I know how elected officials think, about what their staff wants, and what the bureaucrats want and how to get what I want. I don’t give anyone money, just cheer, cajole, pester and VOTE until they don’t want me to write or call anymore.

Yes, I pick up dog poop. I encourage others to do so as well by carrying extra bags. I call when there is a crosswalk I initiated two years ago whose paint has faded so much that it is useless. No-one ever stopped anyway so I’ve asked for a sign in the middle that says it’s state law to stop.

Encouraging positive legislation that helps people is our duty, as voters. Whether it’s your local city council person or state or federal legislator this is your job as a citizen. Determine what matters to you, think it out and write or call in to say a kid died because there was no stop sign. Hopefully that is not the case. Look up representatives by your zip code. We pay them. They work for us. Dee

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Disappointment

Posted on May 5, 2014 | 1 comment

Did you know that mosquitoes kill more humans than humans do? Yes, I’m sure that as part of his research to give billions to save world health Bill Gates would have had a graph made and thanks for that. Don’t feel bad, humans are second on the list for killing other humans, Mr. Gates told us so.

We have standing water below and I get at least ten bites per night even though we are hermetically sealed in our home and haven’t opened a window in three months when there was snow on the ground and everything was frozen solid.

Now there are insects on the interior windowsills and in paper spider traps and the government tells me I’m lying about the bites, and it chooses not to drain the standing fetid swamp. So we are left to our own devices.

I’ve been instructed to rent a room and have a community meeting to discuss, I guess, whether mosquitoes actually exist, whether they breed in standing water and whether they can spread disease like West Nile Virus. They do on all counts. I don’t need to host a community meeting to know that. Perhaps they can call Bill Gates and he can come in to verify my researched conclusion. At least that may get four people in the room (a chaperone, Mr. Gates, my husband and me). Of course I’d make a great brunch.

While our front door is my enemy because it has a lot of space around it for air and bugs to get in, the real enemy is the people whose salaries we pay, day in and day out, to represent us. The only persons they represent are themselves.

Our own devices it is. No community meetings, I’ll just go door-to-door. Everyone who is complaining needs to do more and get others to do so. We probably need $250 and four volunteers to get through West Nile summer. We don’t need the money, just want buy-in at $10 apiece so if my husband is transferred someone will take over.

We’ve been funding the effort so far. It’s time for others to step up to the plate and hit a home run for our neighborhood, even though the entire public and private bureaucracy is working against us. Heaven forbid I mix baseball with football metaphors, but let’s win one for the Gipper. Dee

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Taxpayers

Posted on April 24, 2014 | Leave a comment

Ok, Einsteins. Here is the amount of taxes we pay to our federal, state and local governments through wage deductions and taxes. We’re going to forget the enormous federal, state and local deficits for the benefit of this exercise.

Now take the amount that goes to you and all your trips, your staff, your mistress, and all the “pork” you vote for to aid yourself and fellow legislators. Now consider cost per voter in your district.

Factor in how many times your office doesn’t answer the phone, or respond to an email or letter from a constituent. Add the number of times someone answered the phone and was told “I’ll get back to you” and it never happened.

Another wrinkle. Working with other government agencies and actually talking to your constituents. We pay you for this. In the end we pay you to serve in a representative democracy to serve the people. We are the people. When we get in touch with you, few of us ever do because most people are afraid to deal with authority figures, please get back to us and help us solve the problem.

We’ve had issues over the years and brought them to our representatives and got nothing. They’ve asked us to work on their campaigns promising they believed in our issues and the minute they were elected, imagine my surprise that they changed their minds and were against everything we stood for that helped them get elected. Oh, my.

Here’s my analysis. Business brings not the best and brightest to the top echelons. They may look and sound good but it’s media hype nowadays.

Non-profits take the people who want to change the world, pay these idealists nothing for their passion and hard work, and burn them out in a couple of years.

Politicians take smart kids like me, place them in the trenches with no helicopter in sight, pay nothing and expect 24/7 service. The Bureacracy runs the government. They just wait for the current President to die or leave office, leave things on their desks and whether at any level of government there are divided houses they just wait.

Witness Bill Clinton. In his first term he had a Democratic legislative branch and couldn’t get anything done because he brought in all his own people from Arkansas and First Lady Hillary pushed a health care bill and said she didn’t make cookies.

Twenty years later First Lady/Senator/Secretary of State Hillary Clinton saw some of the best parts of her health care bill passed and may be our next president.

Compromises are made. Serious ones, in which I thought I was a policy wonk doing the right thing, but didn’t want to be a politcian. So I was washed up, my choice, to lobbyist. But that’s another note to you.

If there’s a dead animal on your street call someone. They’ll pick it up but it may stink for a week or two. We pay all these people. On April 15 those who owed (I owed $100) paid. But we’ve paid billions each year to elect people to represent us who would not even consider picking up a dead raccoon from the street.

What was the Revolutionary War? I wonder if some elected officials even know what it was about. Now we have the Patriot Act that monitors this blog, all my emails and phone calls and there was a government of part-time representatives who included teachers. Now it’s all well-funded lawyers who want a lucrative career and even better dollars when they retire.

As of now there are few representatives of the people in our democracy, and fewer who believe in our Constitution and that spying on your citizens and voters without a warrant is not warranted, at least in my version of that document.

Freedom! Freedom from want, freedom from fear, freedom of expression. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Expecting no less, Dee

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Who Do We Elect, and Why?

Posted on July 26, 2013 | 2 comments

Note to professors: you taught me well. But this is from the heart and from years of experience in politics, plus age and wisdom you always knew I’d gain (thanks Fr. C).

Perhaps our founding fathers made a few missteps. Like having no founding mothers. In ye olden days teachers and carpenters and lawyers ran for office. Now it’s only lawyers.

The class clown needs attention because he’s bored with school, gets average grades but knows he can ace everything if he wanted to do so.

Sometimes the politician is class president, I believe a lot of those folks peter out in high school or college.

Today we have Anthony Wiener and Eliot Spitzer running for office in NYC. We have 70 year-old Mayor Bob Filner in San Diego groping women.

Who are we and why do we vote these people into office? My theory is that they are attention-seekers. It would be interesting to see how many are middle children.

When our country was formed it was an honor to run for office. Now it’s a stepping stone to a lucrative career as a lobbyist or attorney. We vote for and “hire” them so we don’t have to deal with legislation ourselves. If there’s a dead squirrel in the street, we may have the wherewithal to call the right department to do dead animal removal. Otherwise it’s someone else’s problem.

We vote for the name or party on the ticket, if we even take the time to vote at all. That’s where the founding fathers faltered. They thought we would be interested in our government and where we are going. In a representative democracy we have ceded all power to the government, and don’t get me started on the NSA and privacy issues.

We just don’t care anymore. A government of the people, by the people, for the people. It’s still summer. Take your kids to the state capitol, or to Washington. Read the Declaration of Independence. Know that we can each make a difference if we choose to do so.

Make the word “politician” a good one, and not one that rates below used car salesman. People who seek attention and get into scandals because of it are not worthy of our votes. Thinking ahead, author of legislation that affected 35 million people, and one that just got three new stop signs installed on our street, Dee

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Blatantly Political

Posted on July 20, 2013 | Leave a comment

Y’all know that “cooking” is more than that, right? At least with me.

I try to deal with issues rather than any party or candidate as I’m independent. These days I don’t know which way is up or down as the Supremes vote against the Voting Rights Act and for gay marriage.

Then all the states that got the Hail Mary pass for anti-Black voters instituted their “reforms.” Then Texas decided to rule against a woman’s control of her own body.

Seeing all this, I believe this to be true, the Republican party is bombing so badly they’re putting it all into the states they may win next year and in 2016 for president so denying rights to over a majority of the population. Great stand.

Why does this bother me? I just got three stop signs with flags on them that actually induce traffic to slow down and stop for me and my dog, because they couldn’t put in an actual stopwalk where the signs are because it’s city/county and they don’t align.

This is what a citizen trying to staying alive crossing the street does. All this stuff about race and abortion does nothing for anyone. We’re taxpayers. We don’t need you in our bedrooms or voting booths.

We need you to do what we elect you (yes, you are supposed to represent us and not just gun and other lobbyists) to follow the Constitution and make things right in the USA, including keeping to a budget and not running us trillions in debt.

The Motor City declared bankruptcy today. How many companies and perhaps cities (you did NYC years ago) will we have to pay for their mismanagement? Too big to fail? No.

I’m all for gay marriage but am a fiscal conservative (just don’t look at my grocery bills).

This is a representative democracy and if I have to run for office to do so, I may have to do so if asked. I care about people. Many politicians may have cared once but then the money train came along and they all got aboard and the people they promised to represent were lost.

A century ago this was a land of Congressmen (yes, all men) that were teachers and of other professions, not all lawyers trying to move up and make more gold in their practice.

What can we do to change this? I’m just a citizen and voter who believes my vote is a joke and no-one ever looks out for my interests. I’ve written laws and worked for government and I believe it has failed all of us. Democracy works, but we need to get involved.

Please register to vote, volunteer locally, even one day a month and know what your fellow citizens are going through. Read your voter pamphlets and VOTE. Thanks, Dee

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Bailouts

Posted on July 20, 2013 | Leave a comment

People don’t think taxpayers pay a burden when our government bails out banks, investment and insurance companies. We do.

Now the Motor City, Motown, Detroit has gone bust and is going to look for funds from us, the taxpayers of the USA.

No-one in the music industry has initiated a concert to raise funds for Motown. They’re $18-20 BILLION in debt. When the Grand Ole Opry is in trouble, country musicians kick into gear.

All the financiers have said “no.” Towns die, mainly for a reason. Why aren’t the auto manufacturers stepping up to the plate? You let your town go bankrupt and now we all have to pay the price. Because you didn’t help out, you’ll be next. Both my husband and I own older foreign cars.

We pay enough taxes as it is to bail out financial institutions but once cities go down, it’s a bit much to ask from all of us to pay even more. Congress, please take that pork off the table and also stop digging into our health care. Mr. President, please lead. Supreme Court Justices, know that while you allowed states to allow gay marriage you did a supreme injustice to Blacks in southern states regarding voting rights.

It seems as if we’re all over the place and the lobbyists are controlling the people we elect and they appoint. We must do better voters, otherwise we cannot avoid the responsibility of being wrong time after time.

We must get involved. Volunteer. Register  to vote. Vote above all else. Ask questions of your candidates. Most will promise you something and lie when elected. Think about if you were a candidate and what you would do for the cause you love most.

Don’t put your faith in politicians. Instant polls, tweets, negative ads, it’s a slippery slope and a mind-set that allows people to be disingenuous and glib.

These people we elect do bailouts for the people who give them the most campaign contributions. What would it take to buy us? To take us from our homes and kids to curry favor and take “junkets” around the world?

Not me. I’ve seen enough and quit when I was making $26, 400 per year. I was rich, but not nearly as rich as my co-worker who started years later and made more than me “because he has three kids.” That’s also why I got to man the desk 18 hours a day as a single gal because I didn’t “need” to sleep or be at home, just cover for them.

Covering is what our government is doing. Let’s stop it. Early morning, sun’s up at 4. Dee

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Voting Rights Act

Posted on June 25, 2013 | 2 comments

An act means we do something. We act on a stage or on screen. We enact a law that does something. We act to prevent our child from getting hurt on the swings.

A voter is a citizen that is of age and is eligible to vote. Voting Rights Act is three simple words but the Supreme Court doesn’t understand that. Voters include women, now, Justices. Voters include African Americans, Latinos, and many other nationalities we made citizens through our history as a “melting pot” of civilized life.

A right is something we earn as a citizen. We earn the right to vote as a citizen when we are eighteen years of age and have registered in a timely manner. We earn the right to drive when we pass several tests and have a father who has elevated blood pressure levels from teaching us how to drive a stick.

Today, our Supreme Court tore the guts out of the Voting Rights Act. I believe it is a patently partisan political act by Republicans to keep Hispanics and Blacks from registering to vote.

I’ve worked in government/politics. It’s simple. The Dems are inclusive, the Rep’s are exclusive. In the end, who is going to win? Is it the person who gives me a voter registration form at the motor vehicle department? Or is it the one who says no forms should be publicly available?

The Republicans had a big win today but I thought my Country was better than this. I want everyone who is eligible to vote, to vote, then we can all hold our representatives accountable for our taxes and what they call “benefits.”

Coming together is the only thing we can do that will make a difference. I’m an Independent. We can shape our future only if we get involved and every citizen/voter has a voice. The time for racism in politics should be over. Voting. Rights.

Act. Congress can fix this. Thank you, Justice Ginsburg, Dee

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