I overthink everything. After a comment by a couple of legislators about how much legislators overall tend to hate scorecards due to how, if I understand correctly, the various scorecards tend to cherry pick bills to use as a guideline to how conservative legislators may be, yet maybe not give the best representation of the true intentions and approach legislators have when making decisions.
If I was in their shoes and I got a terrible score, I’d be frustrated too. I’m sure that all of the seemingly disrespectful comments and harsh criticism that seems to never end from constituents no matter what can get old pretty quickly. I for one am one of those taxpayers who is very critical. I then asked myself why I’m so critical and why are taxpayers mostly as a whole becoming that way and lumping most legislators into the same boat as if they’re all one big pile of corruption?
I believe it comes down to these points:
1. There’s the clearly corrupt individuals who seem to run unfettered in achieving their agenda for their level of government they’re “serving” in. They treat taxpayers terribly unless the taxpayers stroke their ego, ask NO questions, and don’t push them to behave better. There’s many that come to mind for me as examples, the main person being Senator Lee Shoenbeck.
2. We also have good people in government: local to state and beyond. They don’t have any ill intentions and want to do their best according to their personal beliefs. We trust these people to do what’s best for our welfare, we know they do a good job, but then see them do nothing when they witness fellow legislators mistreat taxpayers, violate our rights, & not uphold the Constitution. They stand by silent and won’t hold their fellow legislators and public servants accountable. This lack of action deeply breaks trust.
3. On the flip side, we’ll have good legislators and public servants who go a step further and stand by the corrupt individuals and defend them, which is pretty wild to watch for a taxpayer.
4. I’ve also witnessed people in my local government that I KNOW are good people act very friendly with people in another department of government who are incredibly corrupt, even when I KNOW these good public servants are aware of the corruption we taxpayers all talk about, experience and witness. I think they do this for the sake of “getting along.”
So, with all that said, I want to ask my legislators: Do you see why taxpayers are becoming increasingly frustrated, vocal, and critical? In all of these instances we have NO ONE in our various levels of government willing to step out with US, defend us, and hold the establishment they’re a part of accountable for what those in that establishment are doing.
The optics in that tell taxpayers that we aren’t worth the risk, the energy, the possibly smaller budget, the loss of political clout by fellow legislators and position, etc. and it makes us wonder why not? If we aren’t worth that, then why are any of these people in government in the first place?
I hope this explains why people like me are coming off so critical, frustrated, and seemingly “negative.” All I want is to see more public servants and lawmakers TAKE A STAND with their fellow Americans.
Scorecards are scorecards, and we might get a good picture by getting an average score from all of them. But in the end, the way legislators and public servants truly serve by standing up for citizens, or the lack of standing up for us, speaks volumes to me.