Who is really to blame here?

Once again, the country found itself at the precipice of a government shutdown.

Once again, all the usual suspects emerged to engage in all the usual finger-pointing.

Once again, we will fall for it; every single bit of it.

And once again, we will engage in no self-examination whatsoever.

It's easy to trash "politicians," the "D.C. Establishment" and even "those people" on "the other side." Yet we never once ask ourselves what level of accountability each of us — individually — must bear for our political preferences and our votes.

We complain incessantly about police brutality, yet blindly support promises to "keep us safe", fulfilled by a brutal police state that spies on you and tracks your every movement. We complain endlessly about public profligacy, yet always ignore the spending we approve of or deem "essential," focusing instead on the "wasteful" spending that always seems limited to "the other side."

We believe craftily prepared half-truths designed to damage "those people" — all to satiate an urge to feel powerful over others. Meanwhile, the country burns.

At some point, everyone — yes, even you — will need to come to terms with minding your own business and disabusing ourselves of the desire to have power and control of other people. Highly centralized and concentrated power and control should not be aspired to just because you crave the chance to destroy "those people." As surely as it can be done to "those people," it can be done to you.

Matthew Rothchild

Marion