Read it or weep

We've had a lot of game changing legislation over the past few months. Some of these bills are massive. Both in their effect on the nation and the number of dead trees and ink they consume.

And I've got to wonder whether our legislators are reading these bills of many hundreds of pages. OK, I'm being charitable. I think many of them are not. I think many of them are reading the Cliff Notes.

This is not OK. We send our representatives to Washington to change our country for the better. How on earth can they vote for or against a bill if they have not read it. Completely.

So I'd like to propose new rules for member of Congress. Well, basically it's one rule with a few subparts. The rule is: no read, no vote. That is, if you have not read the bill in its entirety and are not fully versed in its contents and implications then you cannot vote on that bill. How would we find out? Well, there would be a test. On their way to vote, they would have to take a test. If they got less than an 85% they would be barred from voting. The test would be written by some bi-partisan panel of experts.

But wait, there's more.

Three scores in a row of less than 85% and you get kicked out of Congress. One F and you get kicked out of Congress. Statistics on the scores for all members of Congress are made public and the members have to put those scores in large type on their website and in all future campaign ads.

Presidents get tested too. And if they don't pass the test on a bill they wrote, they have to run naked through the Rose Garden. Enjoy those thorns!

We deserve better people. You can have your opinion on various issues. And you can vote for whomever you like. (Once per election please.) But no matter how you feel about an issue, don't you want to be taken seriously and respected as an individual and an American by having the people that represent you take their sacred jobs seriously?

Writing takes heart

If you look at some of my recent posts, you'll notice that I haven't written much lately. Part of the reason is that I've said much of what I wanted to say and I'm not going to write just because there is a social media diktat that you have to keep the content flowing. I write when there's something to say. But it has felt to me like there's something more behind my recent radio silence.

And it occurred to me the other morning that I've been suffering from a lack of inspiration. Work has not been enjoyable for me for some time now. It has been extremely de-inspiring. Not uninspiring. Uninspiring is just a lack of inspiration. Work has been de-inspiring. It has actually been sucking whatever inspiration I do have, right out of me. And it has left me either with nothing to say or without a desire to say anything.

And here's where it gets interesting to me. In order to have something to say, you need to keep your eyes and ears open. You need to care enough to look and listen around you and make observations. You need to think about those observations and play with them in your head so that you develop an idea with some measure of novelty that is worth sharing with others. In short, you need to be inspired.

This is why I have long been such an advocate of innovation and, particularly, creating cultures of innovation. It's not that I appreciate the new cool stuff that comes out of innovation efforts. Although I do. It's not that innovation is good for the economy. Although it is. It's that innovation allows for the human soul to reach its most elevated purpose. It allows us to take our most valued gifts - our hearts and minds and souls - and use them towards their most treasured end.

We all want to innovate. Or, more precisely, we all want to engage our hearts, minds and souls in the direction that our passions take us. And we want to channel those explorations and the ideas that they generate towards the common good. (Unless you're an evil bastard, but I'm not talking to you now so go away.) When we are allowed to do that, we find ourselves inspired. We are happy. We are productive. And everybody wins. When we are not allowed to do that, when institutions block our efforts to pursue our humanity for the common good, when we are forced to spend our time in fear of politics or in meaningless pursuits, then we become de-inspired. Unhappy. Unproductive. And everybody loses.

I'd love to end this post on a happy note. But I can't do that now. I hope that soon I'll have more inspiring news to share.