David Brownlow -- An Open Letter to Congressman Tom DeLay

AN OPEN LETTER TO CONGRESSMAN TOM DeLAY

By David Brownlow
October 6, 2005
NewsWithViews.com

Dear Congressman DeLay,

I can remember the excitement we felt at your victory rally the night you were first elected to Congress in 1984. As Texans, we had such high hopes for you. Many of us let out a collective �Whew, we finally elected someone who will go back to Congress and get something done!� Which makes it all the more painful to see what has happened to you over the last 21 years.

I�m not talking about your legal problems, either. They say a good DA could have a turnip indicted if he wanted to. Besides, even if you did what they say you did, it seems a little silly to worry about corporate bribery in a Texas election - when corporations have bought and paid for nearly every politician in Washington!

No, the problem I am talking about, and not to sound too harsh, is that you have been stealing from the American people for almost the entire time you have been in Washington.

It came to a head recently when you were asked how the federal government planned to fund the $200 billion �Katrina� boondoggle, and you said, "My answer to those that want to offset the spending is sure, bring me the offsets. I'll be glad to do it. But nobody has been able to come up with any yet."

Sadly, for you to make such an absurd statement, it means you have stolen so many trillions of dollars from the American people over the years that you may no longer even be able to recognize that what you have been doing was wrong. That should worry you a lot more than some hotheaded D.A. from Austin.

Let me offer a solution to your apparent lack of feedback for suggestions of recommended spending cuts, because the solution to finding the �offsets� you seek is really quite simple. All you need to do is take a look at the FY2006 $2.6 trillion federal budget, and compare that to the spending powers that have been authorized to Congress by the U.S. Constitution. Anything that does not match up is, well, frankly, illegal.

The following is a brief summary of the top ten budget items, along with the corresponding savings we would realize if the clear mandates of the Constitution were obeyed. These are taken from Table S-11 in the �Mid-Session Review� of the 2006 federal budget.

Medicare/Medicaid: Does anyone actually think medical care is free? Of course not. We all know somebody has to pay for it. And the money can only come from one place � you and me. Why would anyone think the federal government could; confiscate our money, ship it off to Washington, send a little of it back - yet provide better health care than we could if we kept our own money in the first place? The proper way to fund health care in America is to abolish the Medicare/Medicaid programs; and let the states and the people determine how to provide for their own health care. 2006 savings - $619 billion.
Social Security: This one can no longer be ignored. Since the Constitution leaves no provision for larceny on such a grand scale, we should return every penny we have stolen to fund Social Security and the phony �Trust Fund.� Sure, there will be some short-term pain involved in paying back all of the stolen money, but once we do, no one will need a government retirement check ever again. It is time to shut the Social Security Ponzi scheme completely down! 2006 savings - $550 billion.
National Defense: Notice it does not say �National Offense.� We need to end the serial foreign wars, the occupations, the nation building, and the spreading of �freedom and democracy.� We cannot afford it. We should pull our troops out of Iraq, Afghanistan and the rest of the 140 countries in which we have left them to rot. Let�s eliminate gold-plated weapons like the $200 million F22 radar-evading fighter, which has no use if we would quit sneaking around in other people�s countries. Then, let�s mind our own business and let everyone else in the world worry about their own problems. This would virtually eliminate the threat of terror on our soil - and could cut our defense spending by well over half. 2006 savings - $257 billion.
Income Security: Wouldn�t it be nice if all our incomes were secure? Well, dream on. Welfare, food stamps, WIC, unemployment, etc., are nothing short of $360 billion being stolen from those who earned it, and given to those who did not � making the incomes of the rightful owners of that wealth less secure. This Income Security scheme is a crime of an unbelievable magnitude! Let�s just say NO to stealing! 2006 savings - $360 billion.
Education, Training, Employment and Social Services: Aside from the fact that each of these federal departments are completely useless, failing to deliver the �services� they are supposed to, there is no constitutional provision for the federal government to be involved in any one of these activities. So we should abolish them entirely and let the states take care of whatever problems these agencies were supposed to fix. 2006 savings - $89 billion.
Transportation: Other than postal roads, of which there were none listed in the most recent transportation budget, there is no legal provision that allows Congress, or the federal government, to have anything to do with funding highways. Transportation spending has become nothing short of the stealing of money from the people of one state, for the purpose of giving it to those in another state. The correct amount of federal transportation spending should be $0. 2006 savings - $71 billion.
International Affairs: With the exception of the costs associated with congress� mandated responsibility to regulate international commerce, and the costs needed to make sure our immigration laws are being enforced, we should be spending next to nothing on international affairs. We should get out of the UN immediately, and we should quit sending billions of our hard earned dollars to other countries. If we would simply quit meddling in the affairs of others, we would make fewer enemies, and we could cut the �international affairs� budget by at least 90%! 2006 savings - $35 billion.
Agriculture: The US Department of Agriculture has 131,000 employees that work out of 7,400 field offices. This means that on average, there are 2.4 USDA offices located in every single county in America! We should let the farmers do what they do best - which is to farm - and keep the federal government out of it. 2006 savings - $29 billion.
Community and Regional Development: Even tucked in a bloated behemoth like the FY2006 budget, this one defies all logic. Why don�t we let the communities and regions develop themselves? 2006 savings - $20 billion.
Natural Resources and Environment: Other than the Article 1, Section 8 provisions for the �erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings,� there should be very little federal property to worry about. But, until we can transfer the federal properties back to the states, we could be charitable and just cut this one in half. 2006 savings � $15 billion.

Congressman DeLay, as you can see, the above dollar savings represent over $2 trillion that has been stolen from the American people - in just one year! And now that we are in the 11th year of Republican control of Congress, there is no one to blame for this but you and the rest of your Republican cohorts.

I do not know what the penalty is in Texas for taking corporate campaign money, but I bet it is a quite a bit less than the penalty for stealing as much money as you have over the last 21 years. You may want to consider copping a plea on the conspiracy charge, in the hope they do not come after you for the really big crimes.

Then, if you want to repair your damaged reputation, quit worrying about raising so much cash from the corporations. Trust me, they would not be hanging around you unless they wanted something in return. What you need to do is very simple � quit stealing from the people you are supposed to serve! And encourage others in Congress to do the same.

Respectfully,

Dave Brownlow
A former 22nd Congressional District constituent

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David Brownlow, a regular columnist for NewsWithViews.com, is the Executive Director of Life Support, an Oregon based "No Abortion, No Excuses" anti-abortion organization that is focused on eliminating all government funded child-killing. David, an engineer, former Constitution Party candidate, and 25 year political activist, resides in Damascus, Oregon with his wife Suzanne and their four children.

Web-Site: www.lifesupportoregon.org

E-Mail: dave@lifesupportoregon.org

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