I enjoy watching Glenn Beck in the afternoons. He just read a letter he received from one of his listeners and I thought I'd post it and see what others thought. To me, it was very powerful.

Quote:GLENN: I got a letter from a woman in Arizona. She writes an open letter to our nation's leadership: I'm a home grown American citizen, 53, registered Democrat all my life. Before the last presidential election I registered as a Republican because I no longer felt the Democratic Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. Now I no longer feel the Republican Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. The fact is I no longer feel any political party or representative in Washington represents my views or works to pursue the issues important to me. There must be someone. Please tell me who you are. Please stand up and tell me that you are there and that you're willing to fight for our Constitution as it was written. Please stand up now. You might ask yourself what my views and issues are that I would horribly feel so disenfranchised by both major political parties. What kind of nut job am I? Will you please tell me?

Well, these are briefly my views and issues for which I seek representation:

One, illegal immigration. I want you to stop coddling illegal immigrants and secure our borders. Close the underground tunnels. Stop the violence and the trafficking in drugs and people. No amnesty, not again. Been there, done that, no resolution. P.S., I'm not a racist. This isn't to be confused with legal immigration.

Glenn Beck's Common Sense
Now available in book stores nationwide...

Two, the TARP bill, I want it repealed and I want no further funding supplied to it. We told you no, but you did it anyway. I want the remaining unfunded 95% repealed. Freeze, repeal.

Three: Czars, I want the circumvention of our checks and balances stopped immediately. Fire the czars. No more czars. Government officials answer to the process, not to the president. Stop trampling on our Constitution and honor it.

Four, cap and trade. The debate on global warming is not over. There is more to say.

Five, universal healthcare. I will not be rushed into another expensive decision. Don't you dare try to pass this in the middle of the night and then go on break. Slow down!

Six, growing government control. I want states rights and sovereignty fully restored. I want less government in my life, not more. Shrink it down. Mind your own business. You have enough to take care of with your real obligations. Why don't you start there.

Seven, ACORN. I do not want ACORN and its affiliates in charge of our 2010 census. I want them investigated. I also do not want mandatory escrow fees contributed to them every time on every real estate deal that closes. Stop the funding to ACORN and its affiliates pending impartial audits and investigations. I do not trust them with taking the census over with our taxpayer money. I don't trust them with our taxpayer money. Face up to the allegations against them and get it resolved before taxpayers get any more involved with them. If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, hello. Stop protecting your political buddies. You work for us, the people. Investigate.

Eight, redistribution of wealth. No, no, no. I work for my money. It is mine. I have always worked for people with more money than I have because they gave me jobs. That is the only redistribution of wealth that I will support. I never got a job from a poor person. Why do you want me to hate my employers? Why ‑‑ what do you have against shareholders making a profit?

Nine, charitable contributions. Although I never got a job from a poor person, I have helped many in need. Charity belongs in our local communities, where we know our needs best and can use our local talent and our local resources. Butt out, please. We want to do it ourselves.

Ten, corporate bailouts. Knock it off. Sink or swim like the rest of us. If there are hard times ahead, we'll be better off just getting into it and letting the strong survive. Quick and painful. Have you ever ripped off a Band‑Aid? We will pull together. Great things happen in America under great hardship. Give us the chance to innovate. We cannot disappoint you more than you have disappointed us.

Eleven, transparency and accountability. How about it? No, really, how about it? Let's have it. Let's say we give the buzzwords a rest and have some straight honest talk. Please try ‑‑ please stop manipulating and trying to appease me with clever wording. I am not the idiot you obviously take me for. Stop sneaking around and meeting in back rooms making deals with your friends. It will only be a prelude to your criminal investigation. Stop hiding things from me.

Twelve, unprecedented quick spending. Stop it now.

Take a breath. Listen to the people. Let's just slow down and get some input from some nonpoliticians on the subject. Stop making everything an emergency. Stop speed reading our bills into law. I am not an activist. I am not a community organizer. Nor am I a terrorist, a militant or a violent person. I am a parent and a grandparent. I work. I'm busy. I'm busy. I am busy, and I am tired. I thought we elected competent people to take care of the business of government so that we could work, raise our families, pay our bills, have a little recreation, complain about taxes, endure our hardships, pursue our personal goals, cut our lawn, wash our cars on the weekends and be responsible contributing members of society and teach our children to be the same all while living in the home of the free and land of the brave.

I entrusted you with upholding the Constitution. I believed in the checks and balances to keep from getting far off course. What happened? You are very far off course. Do you really think I find humor in the hiring of a speed reader to unintelligently ramble all through a bill that you signed into law without knowing what it contained? I do not. It is a mockery of the responsibility I have entrusted to you. It is a slap in the face. I am not laughing at your arrogance. Why is it that I feel as if you would not trust me to make a single decision about my own life and how I would live it but you should expect that I should trust you with the debt that you have laid on all of us and our children. We did not want the TARP bill. We said no. We would repeal it if we could. I am sure that we still cannot. There is such urgency and recklessness in all of the recent spending.

From my perspective, it seems that all of you have gone insane. I also know that I am far from alone in these feelings. Do you honestly feel that your current pursuits have merit to patriotic Americans? We want it to stop. We want to put the brakes on everything that is being rushed by us and forced upon us. We want our voice back. You have forced us to put our lives on hold to straighten out the mess that you are making. We will have to give up our vacations, our time spent with our children, any relaxation time we may have had and money we cannot afford to spend on you to bring our concerns to Washington. Our president often knows all the right buzzword is unsustainable. Well, no kidding. How many tens of thousands of dollars did the focus group cost to come up with that word? We don't want your overpriced words. Stop treating us like we're morons.

We want all of you to stop focusing on your reelection and do the job we want done, not the job you want done or the job your party wants done. You work for us and at this rate I guarantee you not for long because we are coming. We will be heard and we will be represented. You think we're so busy with our lives that we will never come for you? We are the formerly silent majority, all of us who quietly work , pay taxes, obey the law, vote, save money, keep our noses to the grindstone and we are now looking up at you. You have awakened us, the patriotic spirit so strong and so powerful that it had been sleeping too long. You have pushed us too far. Our numbers are great. They may surprise you. For every one of us who will be there, there will be hundreds more that could not come. Unlike you, we have their trust. We will represent them honestly, rest assured. They will be at the polls on voting day to usher you out of office. We have cancelled vacations. We will use our last few dollars saved. We will find the representation among us and a grassroots campaign will flourish. We didn't ask for this fight. But the gloves are coming off. We do not come in violence, but we are angry. You will represent us or you will be replaced with someone who will. There are candidates among us when hewill rise like a Phoenix from the ashes that you have made of our constitution.

Democrat, Republican, independent, libertarian. Understand this. We don't care. Political parties are meaningless to us. Patriotic Americans are willing to do right by us and our Constitution and that is all that matters to us now. We are going to fire all of you who abuse power and seek more. It is not your power. It is ours and we want it back. We entrusted you with it and you abused it. You are dishonorable. You are dishonest. As Americans we are ashamed of you. You have brought shame to us. If you are not representing the wants and needs of your constituency loudly and consistently, in spite of the objections of your party, you will be fired. Did you hear? We no longer care about your political parties. You need to be loyal to us, not to them. Because we will get you fired and they will not save you. If you do or can represent me, my issues, my views, please stand up. Make your identity known. You need to make some noise about it. Speak up. I need to know who you are. If you do not speak up, you will be herded out with the rest of the sheep and we will replace the whole damn congress if need be one by one. We are coming. Are we coming for you? Who do you represent? What do you represent? Listen. Because we are coming. We the people are coming.

Nailed the conservative talking points pretty well.

And I'm shocked that she had the foresight to include a shout-out to folks to order Glen Beck's book in her letter. No wonder it got read on the air.

I will withhold other comments for a moment, as I'm feeling just a bit snarky, I guess.

Sloth... Interested in why you see this as "conservative" talking points? The person may use conservative language... but

Do you believe only conservatives want...

MORE illegal immigration. MORE violence and the trafficking in drugs and people?? This is differentiated from LEGAL immigration.

Do only conservatives have a problem with TARP?? I've heard plenty of liberals blast it.

Don't liberals have a problem with governmental entities (Czars) designed to circumvention our checks and balances? Do they want Government officials who do not answer to the process, but to the President?? I mean, sometimes that President will be a conservative.

On cap and trade, while some are 100% convinced about global warming... there IS more to say on the solution. I mean, increasing costs here to reduce emissions frequently encourages 3rd world countries to make cheap products and cut costs on things like emissions.. so the net global impact is zero... or in many cases... a loss. How are we supposed to enforce our rules on the world???

On universal healthcare.... he/she didn't say don't do it... they just said think about it and make a good decision.

The states rights issue is clearly a right wing idea... but I've never understood why liberals would fight this... I mean the left is the first one to complain about "the man" in their life... should it matter if it is a Federal or local "man"?? At least if he/she is local, she may have more "empathy" for you than someone who lives 2,000 miles away in a completely different environment.

IIRC. ACORN is under a pretty serious federal investigation... why are we giving a private entity so much power in the first place??

Wealth redistribution is a conservative issue... but I don't know many liberals who write checks to the government because they don't think they're being taxed enough.

Are charitable contributions only an issue for one side?? DO liberals believe in a "one size fits all" national solution to things like homelessness?? Do you have some favorite charities, and some you don't like?? Shouldn't you be free to give to those you support more than others?


Describing TARP GM and the others as a corporate bailout is a left-wing characterization.

Don't liberals want transparency and accountability?

re: Unprecedented quick spending. What is wrong with wanting them to slow down and get things RIGHT as opposed to fast.

I realize you were/are feeling snarky... but just because someone describes things using words that come from one perspective doesn't mean that 70% of the population doesn't generally support that position.

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I will meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about
language, ideas, even the phrase each other
doesn't make any sense.

Seems pretty standard libertarian to me.

If this letter is actually read by any politicians, they won't hear any of the content (some of which is worth hearing). It's all "me, I, we". Politicians are natural egoists, you need to fill a letter with "you" or perhaps "ya'll" to get their attention.

The problems I have with many things in this letter is the same problem I have with many people in America.

1. Complicated problems do not have simple, neat solutions. People who present these are lying. This covers my feelings on immigration and wealth redistribution.

2. (corallary to 1.) You, average lay person, cannot think about an issue for 10 minutes and "understand" anything about it, which precludes having a truely informed opinion on most of the contentious items (i.e., global warming).

However I 100% agree with her on the transparency issues - backroom deals put you on my "never voting for again" list, and that includes Obama if the pro-IP laws go through as rumored. The constitution and checks and balances have been weakened. And cap and trade is stupid and doesn't work.

(06-17-2009 08:14 PM)emmiesix Wrote:  However I 100% agree with her on the transparency issues - backroom deals put you on my "never voting for again" list, and that includes Obama if the pro-IP laws go through as rumored. The constitution and checks and balances have been weakened. And cap and trade is stupid and doesn't work.

I think transparency needs to be at the top of the list. Especially about this illegal firing of an inspector general that no one seems to care about. It is complete BS.

(06-17-2009 08:14 PM)emmiesix Wrote:  1. Complicated problems do not have simple, neat solutions. People who present these are lying. This covers my feelings on immigration and wealth redistribution.

That's one that particularly interests me, and it's a tough one. I'd like to have lots of immigration, because I believe immigration has been and is a great thing. I'd also like immigration to occur legally, because (1) illegal immigration is, after all, unlawful, and (2) illegal immigration is disproportionately available to just a few countries, whereas legal immigrants tend to come from all over the world, and I think it is better to have immigration that is broad-based.

But it seems that half the politicians adamantly posture against ALL immigration, both legal and illegal. The other half, while not necessarily coming out clearly in favor of legal immigration, adamantly posture against any efforts to limit ILLEGAL immigration. Both of these stances seem wrong-headed.

Hambone - I bring up that comment strictly because, in my recent readings across various columnists out there, whether on IBD, Washington Post, and a few other locations, those are exactly the topics that are coming out of the columnists/editorialists that are weighing forth on right now. Down to the 95% unfunded quote. About the only unexpected comment was around charitable contributions, which isn't high on the desk-pounding list right now. But it seemed the weakest element of her complaints.

So, why do we see just the elements that seem to be the current talking points for conservatives/right-wing/whatever you want to call them? Why not anything about the Middle East? North Korea pushing Obama around? For someone concerned about government spending, why no mention of entitlement reform?

In fact, if you've paid attention to stuff I've said, I have concerns in many of those areas, too. But this seemed just too succinct and in-line with the current seeming talking points of conservative commentators for my taste. I'm sure that (the fact it is in-line with talking points) is why Glenn Beck chose it for his program.

As more of a libertarian than anything else, I agree with the talking points in the letter, and I also agree with gsloth's additional items.

Getting an interesting perspective this week, talking with Europeans and now Africans. I think the US's best days are behind us, and we will spend the next few decades sinking into the sunset, unless these (and other) points are addressed. My best guess is that the next 60 years of US history will look a lot like the last 60 years of Europe's history. I just wish I didn't think it will take us 60 years to figure out what they now understand about what works and what doesn't.

(06-17-2009 11:42 PM)georgewebb Wrote:  

(06-17-2009 08:14 PM)emmiesix Wrote:  1. Complicated problems do not have simple, neat solutions. People who present these are lying. This covers my feelings on immigration and wealth redistribution.

That's one that particularly interests me, and it's a tough one. I'd like to have lots of immigration, because I believe immigration has been and is a great thing. I'd also like immigration to occur legally, because (1) illegal immigration is, after all, unlawful, and (2) illegal immigration is disproportionately available to just a few countries, whereas legal immigrants tend to come from all over the world, and I think it is better to have immigration that is broad-based.

But it seems that half the politicians adamantly posture against ALL immigration, both legal and illegal. The other half, while not necessarily coming out clearly in favor of legal immigration, adamantly posture against any efforts to limit ILLEGAL immigration. Both of these stances seem wrong-headed.

I agree. It seems like the only people who are bettered by the current situation are those who profit from illegal immigration-- the coyotes who profit directly, drug traffickers who use the immigrants as mules, and the businesses here who employ the immigrants below minimum wage and without standard employee protections.

Well, I guess we all indirectly benefit to an extent -- the price of goods would be higher if not for the cheap labor available to businesses employing illegals. But the benefit is nowhere near worth the (moral, economic, etc) cost and there has to be a better way.