FROM THE LITTLE GUYS

Let me introduce myself.  I am just a little guy.  My skin is black, if it isn’t brown.  Sometimes it is white, and may have tinges of yellow or red.  I toil in the fields so you may have food on the table.  I labor in what  remains of American factories.  I sell ladies ready-to-wear on the first floor and kitchen utensils upstairs.  I put out fires and protect you from the bad guys.  I teach the children.   I am just a little guy.

You, on the other hand, are a big guy.  Your ego prances through the halls of Congress.  You have a cushy  office in or near the White House or  the Pentagon.  You put on long robes and dare to sit in judgment.   You occupy corporate board rooms and executive suites.  You luxuriate in vacation homes, private yachts, and company jets.  

You have perfected the art of governance: if you throw  enough bones to the dogs they will not bite you.  Keep them busy trying to tease out a modicum of nourishment, and they will not notice who is eating the meat.  

Ah, but we dogs are looking up.  We are beginning to notice where the meat is going.   We are starting to salivate.

We little guys are––finally––recognizing who you big guys are.  You have been granted the greatest gift a people can bestow upon a chosen few––the power to govern.  And you have failed.  Flunked.  You screwed up, betrayed the people who trusted you.   How do I despise thee?  Let me count the ways.

You have sent thousands of Americans to far-away places to kill or be killed.  You lie to us about “terrorists.”  But you are not fighting terrorists; you are creating them.  Every time an American bomb blasts into a civilian home, a new line of avengers appears, ready to die if they can take out some of us with them.  These wars are pointless, brutal, unending, unwinnable.  Their real purpose is to bestow upon your super-wealthy, super-powerful, super-greedy patrons those nice, juicy, no-bid military contracts.

You have taken the wealth of this nation––our wealth––and given it to your already-rich sponsors, with fairy tales about “job creators.”  Then, to “balance the budget”  you cut services to the poor and the middle class.  You are beyond unscrupulous; you are cowardly.  You attack the children, the poor, the elderly, the sick, the handicapped––the defenseless.
 

You have polluted this once-beautiful planet––its waters, its soil, the very air we breathe.   In your greed, you have left our children and grandchildren a legacy of waste, destruction, and financial debt.

In short, your day is over.   We  don’t need you.  Just go.  Do one decent thing in your life: resign.   We little guys take a long time.  But this is an election year.

When Bishop Salvatore Cordileone complained that his freedom of religion is
being denied, he got it backward. It is the Catholic Church that is at-

tempting to deny religious freedom by restricting access to contraceptives

and abortion, including to people who do not subscribe to his religion.

Religious freedom involves the right of every individual to choose which re-

ligious practices he or she accepts, including no religion at all. If you
choose a religion that denies contraceptives, your path is clear: Do not use contraceptives. However, that does not give you the right to deny contraceptives

to anyone else. Nor does it give you the right to use a position of power, such

as control of a school, hospital, orphanage, drug store, or medical license to

impose your religious beliefs on others. Doctors, pharmacists, schools, and

hospitals are licensed by the state to serve the public. Any individual or

institution not prepared to offer full service to everyone is not fulfilling its obligations.