WE THE PEOPLE: Tag! You’re It!

By Clyde Ussery / Chronicle contributor

February 24, 2009 06:14 pm

— As George Bush prepared to go his merry way, leaving the country in shambles, some asked whether or not we can afford the distraction of holding him and his wrecking crew accountable for what they have done to our country. Faced with the gigantic task of repairing the damage, would it not be wiser to forget him? Easier perhaps, but not wiser. Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman put it this way, "...if we don't have an inquest into what happened during the Bush years...this means that those who hold power are indeed above the law because they don't face any consequences if they abuse their power."
Giving his farewell speech, Bush stood there on his clay feet and attempted to convince us that his presidency was not a colossal disaster. Listening to him list his accomplishments was a jaw-dropping experience, Mission Accomplished without the banner. After admitting he did have some regrets, he said, "But I hope you can agree that I was willing to make the tough decisions." Tough decisions like wasting hundreds of thousands of lives, torture, illegal wiretapping? His boasting of making the "tough decisions" is, as some wag said, on par with Jeffrey Dahmer saying, "You have to give me credit for having the fortitude to actually eat someone."
I would like to say that George Bush is totally responsible for the harm and disgrace his administration brought to this country. But, of course, he was aided and abetted by a Congress that abdicated its authority as an equal branch of government. Can we then place all the blame on Bush and the Congress? Not quite. We the people were complicit in the debacle, too. There is a document, the Constitution of the United States, whose bold theme is that all power derives from the People. Not from corporations, not from wannabe Napoleons, but from the People. Yet we ceded that power and stood by while those who care more about corporate interests than people’s problems steered our canoe straight toward the waterfall. While we were engrossed in the antics of the bimbo-of-the-week, we ignored the destruction that our elected officials were wreaking in our name.
An acquaintance argues that the only thing we can do is vote. Wrong. Voting is not our only responsibility as citizens, and it is not our only weapon. It is our responsibility to stay informed and stay involved. We must make our voices heard. The President and Congress work for us, the People. It is imperative for us to understand this relationship, and to understand that our elected officials are not above the law. Our representatives should know that there will be consequences if they abuse their power. It is our job, mine and yours, to deliver that message loud and clear. We cannot wait for someone else to take care of our country. Trusting someone else to do our job is what brought us so dangerously close to the waterfall.