Patroculus – our Maine Coon cat (Photo by John Flannery)
Our Maine Coon cat, Patroclus, is presently cooling himself by placing his body astride a cooling vent, the air gently blowing the fur on his face and broad belly.
Congress prefers the blistering heat of confrontation, and taunts the flames of economic catastrophe, as they represent to the world a nation changeable and uncertain of its purpose and objectives.
When Patroclus falls from a great height unexpectedly, he rights himself, turns his body so adroitly that he falls safely, landing on his feet. Not so Congress.
The Tea-party folk are hell bent on dismantling the “Leviathan” that we ordinary folk call the people’s Congress and the government; they don’t even rent rooms for the night; they bivouac in their congressional offices.
They are opposed to raising revenue and to borrowing, insolvency be damned.
Real people rely on income or credit to cover outlays, but not these guys.
They oppose public schools, clean energy, think climate change is science fiction, and that it’s high time the sick, disabled and retirees fend for themselves.
They hold their leader, Republican House Speaker John Boehner, hostage to their vision of a suicide nation, bringing him to his knees in the Republican caucus he “leads,” disciplining him for agreeing with President Obama to raise taxes.
The T-party members’ malfeasance, if our nation’s future matters, doesn’t end at the Republican water’s edge.
After the Democrats took the Republicans to task for proposed domestic-spending cuts, they threw their support to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s bill that will cut $752 billion from domestic spending and (of course) this is exclusive of what we spend on defense (those wars that are supposedly in our “national interest” in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya and Iraq).
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D.-CA) ranted about not wanting to hurt the Middle Class (those of us who know what we earn and don’t expect to earn $10 Million a year any time soon) but then the Democrats in the House supported those very same discretionary cuts in the Reid bill.
So we have a tumbling act of Republicans and Democrats doing back flips by the hour as they fall through space and time, giving self-serving sound bites that no one believes, and governing not at all.
A rejected Woody Allen once said, “I’m like a cat, I always land on my feet.”
Congress, however, can’t land on its feet when it comes to the middle class.
Experts tell me my cat understand 35 words.
But Congress knows only one word when it comes to the Middle Class - “No!”
We went wrong when we gave a disproportionate vote to the filthy rich who don’t want to shoulder their fair share of what it will take to make this nation a going concern. That’s why Congress won’t demand they pay a dime more for what they wrought.
We went wrong when we gave a vote in Congress to these T-party folk who do not honor our nation’s constitutional framework and its obligation to the people. But we can cure that in the next election.
In the meantime, like Patroclus, we have to prepare to pounce in the next election.
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