#57 / Time Management

The editorial in the Tuesday, February 21st edition of the San Jose Mercury News is headlined as follows: "Power is ours to fix government." The editorial begins as follows:

The Congress is mostly in gridlock. The political parties - particularly the GOP - don't want to compromise, no matter how silly the impasse. The moderate center of political life seems to have disappeared, and many, many people say it is the fault of government.

But the government is us. We control it. Or we could control it if we exercised our power.

I agree with the Mercury News. But there is a problem. "We" can't exercise our power unless we become active participants, instead of onlookers and pontificators. How much time does any one of us spend actually engaged in the governmental process; directly; ourselves?

Self-government, in many ways, is the product of time management. If we can't manage to allocate more of our personal time to government, to "exercising the power" that is, indubitably, ours, then nothing is going to change.

At least not for the better.