By Nicholas Charalambous
Anderson Independent-Mail
April 21, 2006

We all know there isn’t an "easy button" for politics. But I’m tired of everyday folks being too gracious to politicians for their lazy thinking.

We should sympathize with our politicians about how much work it takes to determine what our community’s real issues are, find and evaluate information to understand them and come up with some intelligent thoughts about what should be done.

But we shouldn’t make excuses when they don’t face up to their responsibilities.

If they’re not willing to be public servants, why stand for office in the first place?

To eat rubber-tasting chicken at campaign fundraisers? To listen to people demand quick fixes without making tough choices? To shake hands with people who don’t wash them after they go to the bathroom?

We’ve gotten so comfortable with politicians’ thinking-by-numbers (or colors) that they now think we’re demanding that laziness from them. (Special interest groups think that’s fabulous.)

Want proof? South Carolina Senate leader Glenn McConnell begged his colleagues most of last week to "compromise" on property tax reform to appease voters even if senators weren’t persuaded any plan was best for the state as a whole.
With surprising candor, a volunteer for lobbying group NoHomeTax.org told The Associated Press: "We want results even if they’re wrong."

Want more proof? The idea of raising the state’s 7-cent cigarette tax, the nation’s lowest, to 39 cents, or 40th nationwide, died in committee, again, because some lawmakers didn’t want to renege on a no-new-taxes pledge in case voters punished them for it.

Evidently, they forgot about the pledge to represent the common interests of their constituents. The extra revenue could have either helped cut small business medical insurance costs, expanded Medicaid programs for children or produced tax cuts for working people (or all three, depending on the plan.)

Our primary elections are just around the corner, and I’m hoping that we can get away from this destructive cycle of low expectations.

Politicians can talk all they want about "cutting" taxes, eliminating "waste" and finding "efficiencies," but everyday people should force them to discuss what they’re really talking about: our priorities.

If you support lower taxes, go ahead and specify what services get cut and what government regulations don’t get enforced and what you’re unwilling to fix.

Then be honest about what we’ll have to pick up the tab for in the end (whether in buying private-sector services or in quality of life).

There’s no shame in being honest. Voters will support you if you don’t insult their intelligence.

But we should always remind ourselves: It’s their job to come up with solutions that serve the common good and don’t amount to kicking a can down the road. It’s our job to set and keep those high standards (accepting, of course, that we personally won’t always get what we want).

We’ve gotten the politicians we deserve.

We just have to start believing we deserve more.

Nicholas Charalambous can be reached at (864) 260-1256 or by e-mail at charalambousnc@IndependentMail.com.

Copyright 2006, Anderson Independent Mail. All Rights Reserved.