What Are You Going to Do For Me, Bernie?

My dad came from very modest means. His father told him he was spending too much time on his studies and not enough helping with work, which mean working with his hands. My father was the first in his family to go to college, because some of his teachers strongly encouraged him to fill out scholarship paperwork. He graduated from a university and moved for work.

My mother came from a middle-class family. She went to a university, graduated, and went to work.

My parents met working (someone people should never do now thanks to sexual harassment issues). They dated and, before very long, they married - they didn't shack up for years and pop out children outside of wedlock. My mother had avoided getting pregnant before she married. My father had avoided impregnating before he married. But they wanted children and my mother was not going to abandon her children to daycare.

My father decided he needed to earn more money if he was going to support a wife and children, and that meant getting more education. He worked during the day and went to school at night. He completed his studies and changed careers, and subsequently worked his ass off, keeping his nose clean in the process as he climbed a career ladder. My parents started to have children and bought house that was a good place to raise a family, and they added on to the house as needed as the family grew.

We didn’t live a flashy life. My parents did not spend money frivolously. They emphasized good character and effective studying. We went to public schools. They avoided turning us in to entitled narcissists. We never were encouraged to have anger towards anyone who had more wealth than our family nor seek anything from the government.

I studied hard. I kept my nose clean. I avoided substance abuse and fornicating and putting myself at risk of deadly diseases or knocking a girl up. I was active in a sport, had hobbies, and got a job while still in high school.

Then I went to an affordable university. I never once walked out of class in protest, vandalized or trespassed or assaulted anyone while there, never shouted down any speakers, and I kept working at my job through my full-time studies. I graduated and immediately began working at my job full-time, but also took on some side jobs. After a few years of pounding the pavement, (because I knew I needed to make more money), I was hired in a career-potential job. I also kept my old job, working it part time, and still took on some side jobs. I was working my ass off. I was bringing in much more income than my living expenses, because I lived modestly, drove a used car, practiced good financial habits, avoided crime and substance abuse, and avoiding getting any women knocked up.

I invested my money.

Largely paying for the festivities myself, I married a woman with shared values and goals who’d also been financially responsible, avoided crime and substance abuse, and was never knocked up.  Despite significant challenges, she’d graduated from a university in four years and had gone to work full-time in skilled profession. Like me, she had avoided shacking up with anyone.

I dropped the part-time job and my wife reduced her work hours so we could actually BE married rather than living like mere roommates.

We lived modestly.

When we went ahead with our plans to start a family, as she had insisted and I agreed, she quit her job. We “splurged” on a new minivan by paying cash for it and selling off another vehicle. When market conditions were in our favor, we bought a house so our family would have a stable and otherwise suitable place to grow.

We continue to live modestly. Because we save and invest for our future, there are a many things we want to do NOW that we can’t. Our investments are entirely voluntary. We CHOOSE to invest in certain businesses. The people who work for those businesses ASKED for their jobs, and agreed to take them at the compensation that was offered. The people who buy the products and services of those businesses do so voluntarily. The only exception is when Big Government gets involved.

Now Senator Bernie Sanders, and other people who talk like him, want to punish me and my family. If not directly, they will punish me by attacking, plundering, and restricting the companies in which I invest, to buy votes from a lot of people who have lived beyond their means, who went to schools they couldn’t afford and, often, misbehaved while there, who have frittered away their money and health on substance abuse, who have stolen and assaulted, who’ve been popping out kids out of wedlock.

Why do you want to punish me, Bernie?

What are you going to do for ME Bernie?

Actually, you know what? I don’t want a President who does things for me, other than doing things for the Union of which I’m a citizen. I want a President who seeks to protect the Union from foreign enemies, who’ll prosecute interstate crime, who will veto legislation that does more harm than good, and who will make appointments/nominations of individuals who truly respect the Constitution. I don’t want a President to be my Daddy or Gandaddy or to promise me goodies.

The best thing a candidate for POTUS can say in response to “What are you going to do for me?” is “The same thing I’m going to do for everyone else; try to protect you from foreign enemies and limit government."

The President is not there to solve every problem. The federal government shouldn't even try to solves every problem. Some problems can't be solved. Some things some people call problems aren't problems at all, or are problems of their own making.

Stop looking for a politicians to clean up messes you've made. Stop trying to hire someone to be your bully to take from those who have produced. Make something of yourself.