{"id":280,"date":"2011-04-15T14:44:17","date_gmt":"2011-04-15T18:44:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/?p=280"},"modified":"2011-04-15T14:44:17","modified_gmt":"2011-04-15T18:44:17","slug":"insidious-incumbency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/insidious-incumbency\/","title":{"rendered":"Insidious Incumbency"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>You are quick to testify that America was a transcendental idea in the  1776 world of totalitarian dictatorships. The Founders were brilliant.  Their homage to individual liberty was divine afflatus. The separation  of powers was bedrock common sense, designed to prohibit villainy and  infidelity. But these great men miscalculated.\u00a0 Thinking that time and  experience could only elevate knowledge and wisdom, they couldn\u2019t  envision the unthinkable \u2013 that 230 years later ignorance would sweep  the fruited plain like the Mexican drug parade into Arizona. And even  worse, that corruption would erode the foundations of America\u2019s virtue  like bionic termites with an attitude. You know the Founders weren\u2019t  naive. Painstakingly, they drafted checks and balances to protect the  people from tyranny.\u00a0 They called on Congress to behave as part-time  public servants \u201cof the people, by the people and for the people.\u201d So  much for best-laid plans.\u00a0 Today, the road to Congress is paved with  gold and lifetime wealth.\u00a0 \u201cPublic service\u201d is a lucrative career.  Congress and its supporting bureaucracy are Masters. The People are  servants. The Founders didn\u2019t conceive the rise of this malignancy \u2013 a  protracted Congressional incumbency. Too bad. Now you\u2019re stuck with it.  You witness the malignancy at work. It\u2019s there, in the open, arrogantly  going about its business, ruthless. But only today did you realize how  incumbency eviscerates The Constitution and basic principles of liberty.  Look at one notable example. The people of the Massachusetts&#8217;s 4th  congressional district have elected Newton\u2019s Barney Frank to inhabit the  halls of Congress since 1981 \u2013 for those mathematically challenged,  about 30 years. Three decades. Time enough to have godlike power,  because you see, incumbency is everything. In Frankie\u2019s case, in 2007,  he became chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. Big  Kahuna. Lord of securities, insurance, banking, and housing. Undeniably,  one of the most powerful members of Congress. Bow. Scrape. Only this is  the cretin who, with Chuck Schumer, brought down Fannie Mae and Freddie  Mac to unleash the now infamous housing tsunami and eventual financial  meltdown. Nice job, Frankie. Your financial malfeasance and duplicity  fits right in with your practice of accepting and not reporting personal  gifts and perks, and fixing parking tickets for a male prostitute who  was running a brothel out of your Dupont Circle condominium.\u00a0 This tale  of incompetence and immorality can have only one outcome. You guessed  it, Matilda. The people of the 4th district \u2013 American citizens \u2013  elected him to yet another term. Good show, citizens. Give yourselves a  gold star for blind loyalty, and take solace that you have many comrades  in many other congressional districts who, like you, continuously  exercise their superior intellect. Yes, dear hearts, the Founders  overestimated the Balance of Powers. They could not comprehend that one  congressman from one district could impact, on the most personal level,  the lives of millions of Americans. And herein lies the <em>evil of incumbency<\/em> \u2013 a \u201cfew\u201d people in one district \u2013 with their particular prejudice and  self interest \u2013 control, not only the lives of millions of souls, but  also the state of the nation itself. Unrestricted incumbency is a  virulent cancer. Chemo won\u2019t work. Time to cut it out.\u00a0 But don\u2019t hold  your breath. One of the surgeons is Frankie.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You are quick to testify that America was a transcendental idea in the 1776 world of totalitarian dictatorships. The Founders were brilliant. Their homage to individual liberty was divine afflatus. The separation of powers was bedrock common sense, designed to prohibit villainy and infidelity. But these great men miscalculated.\u00a0 Thinking that time and experience could &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/insidious-incumbency\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Insidious Incumbency<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=280"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":284,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280\/revisions\/284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}