Memo to Congress from the voters

By Craige McMillan

Greetings from the people you were elected to “serve.” As you may recall, the last time we contacted you was during Clinton’s second term, when he began to confuse his office with kingship. As we told you then, the powers of the executive, properly held in check, are really quite limited. The same is true for the current occupant.

First off, you must disregard any so-called “mandate” for the election. The vote was very close, and many of us remain skeptical of the results. The limited number of “swing” states, combined with electronic voting equipment, makes fraud easy to carry out and difficult to detect.

Especially suspect are states controlled by public-sector unions and Democrat election officials. Republican state legislators (not some bipartisan commission) need to immediately begin investigating the fraud that took place. There is always some. Serious jail time needs to result for any perpetrators.

Onto the “fiscal cliff”:

Any nation or enterprise that borrows 47 percent of the money needed for daily operations is not headed over the fiscal cliff – it is already over and headed for the rocks below.

House members, this is your responsibility and yours alone. The Constitution is quite specific. Article I, Section VII, clearly states:

“All bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills.”

Now then, not one dime can be spent without your blessing.

You were re-elected with a majority of fiscally responsible members. We expect you to behave accordingly. The election is over, and you have two years to fix this. Drastic action is called for!

You need to start from ground zero and put back into the budget only constitutional expenditures. Rather than a limited government, you have allowed the federal government to become so large and invasive that no nation could afford it!

Here is what must be done, immediately:

1) Stop spending money. Stop all spending. Do it now. We need to start from ground zero and put in only the essentials.

2) Determine how much money is currently collected in existing tax revenues. This is the only figure that carries reasonable certainty; tax changes always have unexpected consequences.

3) Set aside a prudent amount of current tax collections to begin debt repayment within a reasonable period of time.

4) The remainder of the tax receipts is available for spending.

5) Re-open negotiations with President Obama. Tell him that not one penny is to be spent until an agreement has been negotiated and signed. No backward spending is permitted from the time the stoppage was imposed (e.g. no back wages for government workers).

6) Do not authorize so much as an electric bill for the White House to be paid from government funds. No trips on Air Force One or its cousins. Not one drop of Jet-A fuel in the tanks. No government paychecks, including your own. No state block grants, humanitarian aid, welfare or food stamps. No Social Security checks. It’s lights-out time.

7) Now sit down and look at the spending specifically authorized by the Constitution.

EPA? Not in there. State responsibility. Fire the federal staff, and sell the buildings.

Education Department? Not in there. State responsibility. Fire the federal staff and sell the buildings.

National police force or Transportation Security Administration? Not in there. Airline security is the responsibility of the respective carriers. These are private businesses. The FBI was repeatedly begged by flight instructors to investigate Saudi students who didn’t want to learn how to land or take off, only fly once at altitude. The FBI could not be bothered, and 9/11 resulted.

Foreign aid, United Nations cash shakedowns, global-warming initiatives (you do know the science is very questionable)? Not in the Constitution. If New York City likes the money from the U.N. bureaucrats, let New York City pay for the U.N.

Now let’s talk about wars and foreign adventures. The last declared war was World War II. North Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, all military bases on foreign soil. What were you thinking? Every one of those Americans you sent to an undeclared war died illegally. Pull the plug. There is a lot of money to be saved here!

Domestic spying against U.S. citizens? Why are you allowing the Fourth Amendment to be violated by the administration? Don’t you realize you are there to uphold the Constitution? You are doing an admirable job of creating a police state! Stop it!

Now that we’ve looked at unnecessary or illegal spending, let’s have a look at revenue opportunities. Oil shale would seem to be the silver bullet to restore good-paying jobs, lower the price of energy and enter a second American economic boom. Leasing income from oil shale, mining and timber could be quite substantial and predictable for the federal government.

Unfortunately, the federal government has vast land holdings in many states that preclude these states funding their schools (land grant schools). Without admitting responsibility, you have been paying quasi-property tax to the affected counties. Do you think states are incompetent to manage their own lands? Sell off the land to the states, fire the Bureau of Land Management and Forest Service staff, and stop paying the eco-freako attorneys to sue you!

You see how this works? Lots of your spending is not only illegal, it is downright counter-productive! Get rid of it! Why are you trying to destroy economic prosperity for an entire generation of young people? Do you really want them on welfare?

Now it’s time to get to the charitable trusts and 501(c)(3) corporations, most of which are neither charitable or trustworthy. In fact, their main work seems to be illegally influencing public policy and adding to the taxpayer’s burden.

Now is the time to let them implement all of the fancy ideas they’ve dreamed up for the rest of us to fund. Implement them at their expense. Require them to spend down their vast asset pile over five to 10 years, and require that it be on public charity and welfare, which is what they were chartered to do. Some of them will actually come up with something useful.

Now about that corporate welfare. It is much easier and cheaper to hire lobbyists and pass laws to keep your competitors at bay than it is to innovate and improve your products and services. This has not served us well! Stop aiding and abetting laziness and sloth at the CEO level. Unwind the tax breaks. That way, instead of whining about how much CEOs are paid, you will be doing your part to make them work to earn their money. Right now, it seems you pass laws in return for campaign contributions. We’re not saying that you do, of course. But it sure looks that way to many observers. You do realize that corruption breeds contempt?

Now, of course, much of your re-election money would dry up if you did this. So get creative: Newspapers have in the past held a public trust, before they were corrupted from the rotating government door in D.C. A major source of media welfare is election spending, which flows from candidates to the media.

Since the media holds a public trust, why are they not required to set aside a portion of their advertising space each election for candidates running for office? Think of it this way: You wouldn’t need to raise nearly as much cash from lobbyists as you do now. Why, you could even focus your efforts on representing the people who elected you!

Speaking of tax breaks, shouldn’t we be looking at the “earned income” tax credit? This seems asinine! If you don’t pay taxes, how are you eligible for a refund? If you don’t pay taxes, you don’t get a refund!

Now, Mr. Obama will be inaugurated for a second term. Check his father’s nationality – and the Constitution’s residency requirement for the president. Surely the U.S. Supreme Court justice should know this.

Finally, your reliance on the courts to sort out disputes between co-equal branches of government is – pathetic. The courts have no authority to order the executive or Congress to do anything, as you well know. So why bother? Do you think we are fooled?

Impeachment is your remedy. We would suggest simultaneous indictments against Mr. Biden and Mr. Obama, in combination with at least a four-year investigation. Due to the seriousness of the charges and the propensity to flight, both Mr. Biden and Mr. Obama would need to be held in confinement during the investigation. Given this regrettable state of affairs, Mr. Boehner, as the speaker, would have to assume the duties of the executive during the interim.

Problem solved. Now stop whining. Take a nice Christmas break. Go home to your families. By the time you come back to D.C. next year, even Harry Reid will begin to see things your way. If he wants to flush the Senate toilets again, that is.

 

Craige McMillan

Craige McMillan is a longtime commentator for WND. Read more of Craige McMillan's articles here.


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