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Procrastination In Politics

It is a well-known fact that college students, regardless of their majors, spend endless hours each semester studying the art of procrastination.  In the past this skill was criticized and deemed detrimental to success in the “real world”, but no longer.  Thanks to the 2012 election cycle, procrastination equals votes or at least the attention of voters.

In Speaker of the House John Boehner’s recent interview, he spoke on the issue of Student Loan Interest Rates and the need for legislation to keep them low.  He stated, “Democrats and Republicans knew that this was going to take effect. Democrats and Republicans fully expected this would be taken care of and for the president to make a campaign issue out of this and then to travel to three battleground states and go to three large college campuses on taxpayers’ money to try to make this a political issue is pathetic and his campaign ought to be reimbursing the Treasury for the cost of this trip.”

In three months’ time, if legislation is not passed, student loan interest rates will jump from the current 3.4% to 6.8%.  Such a startling and seemingly arbitrary increase makes for a wonderful campaign topic. It is not surprising that congress has waited until now to decide how to avoid such an increase.   Ironic that it was a Democratic controlled House in 2007, which set the July 1, 2012 date for the 3.4% to disappear.  Now as Speaker Boehner asserts, both Republicans and Democrats alike are working together to make future student loan recipients happy.  Awe, bipartisan cooperation at last.

Yet timing is everything, and now the Republican controlled house is acting quickly to assure young voters of Republican interest in their welfare.  Too bad the President already had his three-state tour planned before Boehner made his public declaration of support for younger voters.  I guess the President could have changed his travel plans, or at least his talking points, but he didn’t.

Nevertheless, all this attention must be making college students giddy. Back in 2008, college age voters turned out to support President Obama.  By the time the Republicans figured out the political momentum of young, tech savvy voters, it was too late to make headway with this voting group.  This time around, Republicans are paying attention.  That is what is really important here – paying attention to the youth.

Presidential campaigning via Air Force One has been standard since before the current president was born.  Presidents go from place to place shaking hands, kissing babies and posing for pictures, all while taking their work and staff with them.  During these trips, the “common man” has a rare opportunity to meet with our highest elected official.  The fact that in this case the “common man” is a bunch of students, rather than business men or politicians does not change the value of presidential meetings with the public.

In an age where money equals voting power, it is nice to see the moneyless college masses actually matter to the politicians.  Republicans should be avoiding further procrastination and jump on the band wagon.  Rather than railing against the President for spending taxpayer money on visiting students and discussing student concerns, maybe they should be celebrating the fact that our younger voters matter.  It is going to take years to fix the mess in D.C. It is going to take fresh ideas. The youth of today will inherit the mess their fathers and grandfathers created, and it will be the youth of today that will find the solutions.  Politicians should stop procrastinating and recognize that young voters are just as important as old voters.  While they might be cash poor, they are idea rich.

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Answered Prayers

Prayers are often answered in the most unexpected ways. Preconceived notions can cause us to miss the answer when it comes. Therefore, we must always be receptive and alert.  Most especially, we should be grateful, regardless of how the answer is delivered or by whom.  The Lord will send us angles and answers to our prayer, but we must be willing to receive them.

Matthew 21:22

And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.

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A Dilemma to Ponder

A recent media blitz has centered on whether men or women have been more adversely affected by the current U.S. recession. It is just the latest in a long line of discussions about unemployment and the slow economy. Democrats have pointed to the fact that the bad economy began during the Bush years.  Republicans have pointed to the fact that Obama hasn’t “fixed” the economy during his three years. It seems everyone has an opinion about rich people’s taxes, rising gas prices, and the ineffectiveness of government.  

With all of these opinions, is it strange that there is confusion on what the candidates believe? 

So when a candidate actually speaks about what they plan to do if they are elected, I like to take notice.

 “I’m going to take a lot of departments in Washington, and agencies, and combine them. Some eliminate, but I’m probably not going to lay out just exactly which ones are going to go,” Romney said. “Things like Housing and Urban Development, which my dad was head of, that might not be around later. But I’m not going to actually go through these one by one. What I can tell you is, we’ve got far too many bureaucrats. I will send a lot of what happens in Washington back to the states.” Mitt Romney 15Apr2012

It is important to remember that for every “bureaucrat” who works in D.C., there are dozens of regular support staff who are simply trying to earn a wage. It won’t be easy for them to find replacement jobs, even if jobs get sent “back to the states”.

While I agree that the federal government is too big and could use some serious pruning, I wonder if a recession is the right time to be talking about large scale downsizing.  

It does make for a dilemma…

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A Chocolate Elephant

The following is a common saying in our household.

How do you eat an elephant?  

One bite at a time.

Well today we modified this saying.

How do you eat an elephant made of chocolate? 

One bite at a time – one bite every day.

Why the change?

First, chocolate seemed much more pleasant than thinking of eating a real elephant.  Second, to make it through something as big as an elephant, one needs to be consistent in the task.  Eating too much too fast can bring on all sorts of complications.  Taking too large of breaks between bites could cause problems as well.

So when you have an elephant of a task to tackle, daily bites will get the job done. Plus it never hurts to eat some chocolate along the way.