"The Fine Print", by Michael Schrader

MORAL AUTHORITY ESSENTIAL TO EFFECTIVE GOVERNMENT

By Michael Schrader, with commentary by Genevieve Schrader

(Written and posted 20 December 2010)

A government can only govern with the consent of those being governed. A government that no longer has the consent of the governed can no longer govern.

How does a government have authority with the people? Coercion and force is definitely one way. By controlling the police, the government can force its will on its citizens whether they like it or not. Sure, this method will work for a time, but ultimately a government that derives its authority not from the voluntarily consent of the people but by forced cooperation will stoke such resentment and hatred from its own people that it will come to a dramatic death. Remember Nicolae Ceausescu, the last of the Communist leaders of Romania? How about Nikolai Romanov, the last of the Russian Tsars? The Iron Curtain literally fell overnight. When a people have been oppressed by their government, when they feel that their government is morally bankrupt, they will not fight for their government, they will fight against it.

In our great country, governments govern exclusively by the consent of the governed. Government makes laws and regulations and we, the people, follow, because of the moral authority of those that we, the people, have chosen to represent us and our interests. The problem comes when the government, and specifically, the elected leaders of the government, lose the moral authority to lead. We live in troubling times where governments, big and small, are dangerously close to crossing that line where their moral authority becomes hollow and illusory.

Good government is equitable. Good government is egalitarian. Good government has neither a blind eye nor a deaf ear. This is not to say government should be an advocate; it should not. But, government should strive to ensure justice for all, and that that justice is timely as well as fair.

Government is like the referee in a sports contest. If you saw the referee in a game wearing the colors of one of the teams, or cheering for one of the teams, you wouldn’t have much confidence in the calls, especially if the team that the referee is advocating just happens to win. No sports league would ever tolerate officiating crews that would even have the appearance of partiality, as the fans would abandon the league in droves and the league would fold in disgrace, and forever be infamous.

Why, then, it is okay for the government, which is supposed to be the impartial arbiter of justice, to advocate one side over the other? It is not, but yet we allow it. We turn a blind eye when our planning officials advocate the abdication of planning to help friendly developers.

So, basically, talking about government is really idiotic and only the biggest nimrod would care enough to read so far as to actually see what I’m saying. And, if you are reading what I’m saying, then you are stupid and have no life. Go out, gamble, get a girlfriend, do something!! Ok, so, if you’re still reading this, then there’s no hope left for you and you’re going to die a sad and lonely death. Ok goodnight!!

Ok, just seeing if you were actually paying attention. Sometimes one has to take a bit of creative license to see if anyone is really paying attention or if I have completely numbed your mind into a drooling stupor prattling on and on about a rather dry topic that 300 million Americans, like my lovely teenage daughter, Genevieve, who wrote the previous paragraph, really couldn’t give a flying flip about. Therein lies the problem.

More than just a handful of people should care when their government favors one citizen over the over. More people should care when a planning director states it is not her job to advise people what they can and cannot do with their property. (When I was a planning director, I guess I was in error thinking that it was my job to advise people of the land use plan, which advises what people can and cannot do with their property. But, I am an old idealistic fool…) More people should care when their engineering staff make decisions that are not based on sound engineer principles but instead on political expediency. Once the moral authority of the position is destroyed, how could any reasonable person be expected to believe any future decision which is based on “sound engineering principles” is actually so, when decisions have been made which were not?

Lots of big words there! Do half of you even understand what is being said? Because I sure don’t. Ok, it’s one thing to talk about something like government, but can you not use so many complicated words???

Another astute observation by the teenager. Do we understand what is being said by the government? Or are we being fed a bunch of big words intended to obfuscate and distract us from what is really going on? Listen to government officials and they will prattle on and on and inundate use with legalese and statistics and never answer the fundamental questions that we want asked. I attended a planning commission meeting where the question put to the staff was how to balance historic preservation and economic development and the answer was a mind-numbing PowerPoint presentation that my wife tried to watch and I swear lost a good percentage of her brain cells watching. Unfortunately, it is only a token few that understand that they are being fed a bunch of baloney sausage, as my dearly departed granny would say, while the masses just accept the gobbledygook being fed to them just to get the torture to end. Or, because they don’t want to embarrass themselves by acknowledging they don’t have on iota of a clue what is going on. Either way, this apathetic acceptance is what allows it to continue.

Right now, the lovely teenager is reading this in a British accent. While she is trying to mock, she has enlightened me that the mind numbing b.s. that our government promulgates as policy does remind one of Dickens’ and his mockery of the British judicial system in Bleak House, where the attorneys spent the entire estate that the were probating with endless motions and briefings. The joke in Bleak House was how the attorneys and the government spent their entire time on procedure and never accomplished the task that they were entrusted to complete. We have become more British than we care to admit.

Ok, so basically there are two things I would like to add: A) This is America, not Britain. And B) Most of you who are reading this are from Oklahoma. So this is Oklahoma!! You don’t have to have good grammar, spelling, or use big words to get respect. Most of you probably have never read Bleak House. I certainly haven’t. Most Oklahomans can barely read simple grammar, let alone Dickens’ funny British accent. They can’t really decide if they like you or not if they can’t read or understand what you’re saying. So I’m basically mocking the dude who’s typed this thing mostly in proper grammar because he’s trying way too hard. Just be a typical Oklahoman who wants to make the world a better place! That’s all we care about. Not your grammar, your intentions.

The lovely teenager is right. This is the United States, and not Britain, and most of the populace does not understand fancy words or use good grammar. We have a populace that has been dumbed down in government schools, thus allowing the government a free reign to do whatever it sees fit knowing that that sheeple are too ignorant to understand what is really going on. We need people who want to make the world a better place, who want to make the government, our government, helpful and responsible to us, the governed.

We need to restore the moral authority to the government and those who work for it. It is time to restore our trust and confidence in our government, before it is too late. Once the government loses that, it is destined to fail, and fail dramatically. Just ask the leaders of the Soviet Union. Or the Shah of Iran.

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