Who Do They Work For?

In my opinion, we have Senators and Representatives to vote and make decisions because it simply isn't feasible to ask every citizen to vote on every item that needs to be decided. Especially back at the beginning of the nation, when mail took days to get from one city to the next. So our founding fathers decided that all the citizens would vote and pick the people who would represent their interests. Those people would meet in the nation's capital to discuss, debate and decide on the various items that came up.

Over the past couple of centuries, that method has gotten off track. Big businesses lobby, persuade and donate big bucks, and in return, Congresspeople vote the way those big businesses want them to vote. For instance, the US is still giving subsidies to big oil companies that are making billions in profits each year. Those companies feel entitled to that money, even as the US struggles to find ways to balance the budget. "Take away our subsidies, and we'll raise your gas prices," seems to be what they told Congress. I say, so what? They're going to raise our gas prices anyway. Have you noticed that price shoots up 10-15 cents/gallon every time there's a whiff of possible bad news about the supply? But if there's definite good news, like the price of oil has come down $40 a barrel, the price of gas might come down 1-2 cents/gallon, if it comes down at all.

In my opinion - and I told my senator this - the US should stop giving that money to the already gluttonous oil companies and use it to make other types of energy available to the general populace. I would love to have an electric or hybrid car, but I can't afford the initial purchase price. Raise the price of gas too high, and those companies will just push us towards other fuel forms that much faster. So there.

But my senator didn't listen to me. He voted to continue the subsidies. After all, the paycheck he gets from big business are much bigger than anything I can offer him. They aren't working for 'the people' any more.

Where Did Spring Go?

More than 6 weeks ago, my friend and I drove south, looking for spring, and started noticing flowering trees and bushes right around the border between Tennessee and Georgia. We were sure that meant spring was just around the corner, and we considered washing our winter coats while we were in Florida, since we wouldn't need them again until November or so.

We came home at the end of March, happy to have those coats after all – so cold and wet! For most of April, we asked each other, "Why isn't spring here yet?"

Apparently, it did feel like spring to the plants – local trees and bushes flowered, lawns greened, and tulips bloomed. Still, some of them were uncertain; the locust in the front yard only had the tiniest of leaf buds.

It was chilly, overcast and wet so many days, it seemed more like autumn than spring. And since I get crabby in the fall (anticipating that cold icy winter), I've been rather crabby since returning home.

Suddenly, May arrived. And within that first week, the weather went from chilly-and-cold, 'when-do-we-get-to-turn-off-the-furnace?' to 'open-all-the-windows,-where-are-my-shorts-and-it's-too-early-for-air-conditioning!' Jeepers, did I sleep through spring?