We’ve not gotten our money’s worth from this legislature!
(As published in the Lake Sun Leader)
To quote former Republican President Ronald Reagan, “Are we better off now than when we were (in the year 2000)?”
We Missourians are strange folks, we are accustomed to paying the people we hire to work until the job is done to our satisfaction.This legislature must think they represent Florida since they are finished before they ever start and thinking of retirement as soon as they are elected to office.
Since 2005, the lawmakers of our great state of Missouri have managed to pass some unbelievable legislation in the brief time they actually work. We can all take pride in the fact that they just recently managed to kick at least 170,000 poor Missourians off Medicaid. Now our poor neighbors and their families will receive no preventive care and will be jamming our already over-taxed emergency rooms for every sniffle, cough or illness because they have nowhere else to turn.
With domestic violence on the rise in Missouri, our legislature has met the challenge by passing a law so that every Missourian can now argue with a loved one, run down to the nearest store and within 15 minutes, buy a gun to shoot them. It truly warms the heart to know that this legislature has put a price tag of only $500,000 on punitive damages (punishment) for lost limbs, deaths or injuries caused by others including incompetent physicians.
Our lawmakers didn’t forget the working men and women when they made at least 30 changes to the Workman’s Compensation laws successfully roadblocking legitimate claims for injuries.Our state legislators can sleep soundly at night knowing that Missouri’s kids are being left behind during the “No Child Left Behind” initiatives supported by our Republican Gov. Matt Blunt and implemented by the Republicans running Jefferson City.
Of course the Republicans running the state’s house and senate have a perfectly good explanation why things are the way they are. They say that they are not professional politicians for the most part. On this point I certainly agree, ladies/gentlemen you are not professional politicians and it shows in the quality of your work.
I say let’s lower the salaries of all the lawmakers in Jefferson City to start at the minimum wage they expect working class people in their state to live on. Then put a time clock outside each of their offices to keep track of how much time they spend working for the people that hired them to do their jobs. We will then give those lawmakers a raise based on how much time they put into their jobs and how much legislation passes which benefits the poor, elderly, young, sick, uneducated or working class majority they are supposed to be representing. The sad fact is that the people who need their state government the most are being let down by this legislature.
Where do the poor, uneducated, sick and elderly turn when their lawmakers have no compassion for their problems?
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