I was at Subway the other day.  While I was waiting in line, one of the workers was refilling the bacon.  As he removed the top layer of packaging, I had to laugh as each layer of five little pieces of bacon was separated by voluminous sheets of packaging.  So much so, that I have to believe that the volume of the packaging was thrice the volume of the product.  Lest one think that this is a rant directed at Subway, think again.  This only got me thinking.  As a new parent who has to “some assembly required” the toys my daughter receives, I can attest to the fact that many industries face this problem.  Since when does the packaging over take the product itself.  While it may not be an intuitive connection to draw, the reason stems from the litigation happy nature of our society.  Everything has to be quadruple packaged or something might happen and I might get sued.  Granted, it is important to have safe packaging.  But at some point the size of our packaging must be weighed against the size of our landfills. 

Common sense tells you that when you suck at your job, you should get fired.  This holds true for most of us in the real world.  Exceptions include: CEOs (golden parachutes), college football coaches (contract buyouts), and politicians (the power of incumbency). 

I am a football fan.  I love to watch football on TV, or be in the stands.  I bring this up because I don’t understand something.  This blog is meant to be about Common Sense.  Coaches are the people meant to teach our young players how to exemplify the things that the game is supposed to teach.  Sportsmanship, teamwork, perseverance are the ideas that come to mind.  If you look at college football, coaches are about nothing but money.  They can jump ship with little thought of their contract, the players or the fans.  The Universities make vast sums of money off the exploits of these young men.  The coaches in turn make vast sums of money from the University.  The coaches who recruit these athletes then jump ship when a better offer comes along.  What does that teach about commitment, perseverance and teamwork.  We wonder why generations of Americans have less commitment and more of a sense of entitlement. 

I just got the 7th season of “The West Wing” on DVD.  It is making me think about elections again.  It is, after all, less than two years away.  I saw that Senator Obama is now making the early moves towards a run for President.  He is the umpteenth person to “create and exploratory committee”.  I do not believe that this is the way that the founders intended our Democracy to run.  It seems like the classic wag the dog phenomenon.  Do politicians run for office in order to govern, or do they govern in order to have a record on which to run?  They seem to spend an equal amount of time on each. 

Global warming is something that has been in the news a great deal lately.  All but the most out of touch scientists now acknowledge that human activity is slowly warming the earth’s atmosphere.  The science is now there, but nothing seems to happen.  In a free market scenario the increase in energy prices should trigger and aid in the development of new technologies in the market.  but, as long as America uses its military might (or the threat thereof) to maintain artificially low energy prices (see energy prices in other countries) the free market that some politicians love to tout is restrained.  The auto industry is also not held accountable.  While our leadership loves the idea of setting an impossible (statistically speaking) goal and expecting people to strive for it, like in education (never mind that there you are dealing with impressionable young children who you are setting up to fail); it fails to do so with the auto industry and its requirements for gas mileage.  Is it because of the influence of the auto industry lobby, the oil lobby or that they actually think it is the right thing to do?  Who is to say but the lack of advancement in this area is curious.  The former secretary of Transportation Norman Mannetta who served under both Clinton and Bush seemed to take umbrage with the lack of progress in this area.   I think this exemplifies the influence special interests exert over our leaders.  At a time when we should be looking to what is best for Americans, their children and the future of the planet, we deserve better.  As a country that claims to be a world leader, we take a backseat to almost everyone else in the world when it comes to the environment. 

The House of Representatives just passed a bill to increase the minimum wage.  The interesting part of this debate is, as with many others, how black and white this issue is for some people.  We have one side that says we must make dramatic increases to the minimum wage and have no regard or acknowledgement of the possible consequences of lost jobs and inflation.  The other side is convinced that there should be no increase in the minimum wage.  The needs of minimum wage workers are completely irrelevant in the face of possible job loses and inflation.  Where is the intelligence to understand a more complex world where all of these variables can be optimized. 

So many issues, so little time.  I have been reading a book lately that spells out how certain politicians use the issue of gay marriage to be a wedge between groups of people.  I always have to ask a couple questions.  First of all is your church performing any of these ceremonies?   If you truly object on religious grounds you should be objecting to a religious ceremony and not civil rights.  Second, are you or anyone you that you don’t disown divorced?    The 50% of heterosexuals that end their divorces in divorce do just as much to “defile the sanctity of marriage” (in addition to the hypocritical railing we hear).   Finally, is the 14th amendment to the Constitution still enforced (as equal protection should apply, right?)?  I cannot believe people focus on this when 45 million or more Americans don’t have health coverage, when our education system is falling behind others in the world and we have the fear of a terrorist attack staring us in the face.  This proves once again that the people who purport to lead are only in to win.

Here we are, into the new year 2007.  I have to laugh as I was watching the new session of Congress the other day.  I, in case you have not read the rest of the drivel on this blog, pride myself on being a centrist and an independent.  I think that the way the new Congress is running is amusing.  I heard one of the Republican members of the House standing up and railing against the Democratic majority because they were running things through and not giving the Republicans a chance. They we doing this even though they said they wouldn’t.  Oh my goodness.   This is wrong on so many levels.  First, on the issue of doing what you said you would.  Hello pot, are we calling kettle something.  On the issue of giving the minority some rights, I refer you to my answer on issue number one. 

A definition of leadership (I looked it up) is guidance or direction.  Look at all of the popular front runners for the 2008 Presidential Election.  Are they stepping forward with bold new ideas?  Are they standing up for their principles?  No, they are “positioning” themselves on the issues of the day.  That is to say, they are seeing what is popular and “tweaking” or “shifting” their ideas to match.  In a Democracy the majority is supposed to rule.  In a Representative Democracy the people are supposed to elect, and the elected are supposed to lead.  How many examples can you find of politicians who are for something until it doesn’t work out like they had hoped.  Then it becomes a game of who can shove off the blame to someone else or find a lower level scapegoat to take the blame.  With all of the scandals, jockeying for the 2008 election and the culture of Washington, there is plenty of blame to go around.

Interest groups.  Everyone joins them.  The purported goal is to have strength in numbers.  The problem is that they become so rigid in their ideological attacks on everything they don’t ever stop for a dose of common sense.  Interest groups take away middle ground.  The NRA is so busy opposing any restrictions on guns they don’t allow for the idea of any commons sens restrictions that would strengthen their position.  Lest one think that I am a left wing nut job the other side is so in favor of banning all guns that they refuse to favor incremental steps that would make us safer.  The problem seems to be that the political discourse in the nation has become depolarized.  Instead of two ideologies meeting in the middle, we have come to a situation where they repel each other to the extremes.  Congress is the prime example.  Instead of making compromises that favors all, both sides hold out to get their way.  Who really loses in this scenario?