“Molasses running uphill in a snowstorm”

In exactly two weeks the end of this administration will come and a new one will begin. It is without a doubt a happy occasion for most, including myself, albeit from perhaps a slightly different angle than many on whose side I usually find myself seated. It is not the passing of one man in a position of power but rather the end of an era of do nothing government, as policy.

The Bush administration has proven how much power government has by not attempting to do what government is supposed to do. It has failed to enforce laws it ought to enforce, investigate malfeasance, failures, and graft, and proved just how much standing idly by can harm a nation and its people. The litany of events in which the current administration has bullied and subverted the true course of provision of services the government is both by law and by moral code bound to provide are staggering, and it is this paucity of action that will live on as its legacy.

There are so many examples that have crossed the front pages of newspapers far and wide, foreign and domestic, that sometimes the details of how get buried. It is in the appointment of officials of no note, of the attempts to silence dissent with threats of termination, and the deft of letting positions go unfilled, the latter resulting in a rudderless boat which simply bobs in the sea of needed actions. People appointed rarely stick around for more than two years anyway, but refusing then to fill their slots has resulted in a decision making backlog that will come to haunt the new administration.

Many of us¹  have been stymied in our efforts to fulfill our pledges of service, we have been disappointed by the further besmirching of our work by those above, and those outside (and we cannot begrudge them their anger and disappointment for it is ours to bear and felt even more keenly), and we want our actions to be considered at least as good, if not better than, in our actions for our fellow citizens. We hold ourselves and each other (and we do notice those who fail to do the same and it is grating) to a higher standard and that our political masters have failed us so absolutely is a mockery of us and of the principles we hold dear.

The new administration will find treasure troves of data locked up for years, suppressed and ignored; much will have to be redone, to be updated and stripped of political interference. Placing too much stress and hope upon the new administration, as it attempts to unstick the gears, and find a way to engage the cogs will take a great deal of time. Just as it takes more than a moment to turn a great ocean liner, so too it will take time, patience and a deft hand to get the system moving once again. The clamor for action is loud, often yelled from rooftops by those who profit from the screaming (shrillness + blog + ads = money, money, money) but not the action, whose impatience will cost us perhaps as much as inaction. This is not the time to pretend that we have an easy way out, a sword to a Gordian knot, no it is a time to take a measure of the task ahead and to work in concert with those we have now elected.

No one cares to have their boss peering over one’s shoulder constantly, begging for 8 years of work in 8 minutes, months, or 4 years; don’t be that guy. A sentry walks the corridors of power methodically, and offers not just opinion but understanding and her own contributions. There is patriotism in the objection and in the protest but there is also patriotism in the doing for others, in recognizing that patriotism doesn’t flow from a wallet, but from a sacrifice given readily in deed and in thought.

¹ I am fortunate enough to have found a place where I can fulfill my duty, but many, many others are not, and for them I write in the first person plural.