What kind of government do we really have?

As a teacher, I had a strange epiphany the other day. Considering all the controversial things we’re teaching or not teaching our students today; I was recently helping a student work on a social studies assignment. I was caught off guard by what we are teaching about our government.

Why? As we read through what the Senate and the House do, it was interspersed with platitudes on what elected people do for us. Simple things like “to help their states constituents” or “representing the interest of the people of their district.” We might want to investigate, revisit, or even reconsider why we send these people to D.C.

What happens when they get there? Are they indoctrinated into a culture of self-service, and they lose touch with who they’re supposed to be serving? I thought they signed up because they understood who they were going there for. My cynical assumption is that power and greed are king. Who’s paying the bills for these people? Corporations? Special interests? What I know is there is a level of dissatisfaction with our government that I’ve never felt before. Among friends and family across the political spectrum optimism is waning. Are these officials representing “The People?” Let’s imagine that money isn’t king for those in Congress. They had term limits, no one could buy them, and they went to work every day for us. What would this country really be like? It might even be like the fiction I was reading with my student.

Symon Sanborn

Marion