So, you think the Republicans in Congress are not really part of the swamp. Well let’s look at the new national holiday known by the dumb name of Juneteenth that just passed the Senate without a dissenting vote. The new holiday is meant to commemorate the end of slavery in America. Strangely enough, the day does does not celebrate Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, nor even passage of the thirteenth amendment, but the day some obscure general announced in Texas that slaves were free.
Though I have never heard the name before, I read that many states already designate Juneteenth as a special day. The question is; why was the Texas event on June 19th selected? If we are going to celebrate the end of slavery, wouldn’t it make the most sense to celebrate the date of the Emancipation Proclamation, or the day the thirteenth amendment constitutionally banned slavery in America?
Whoops! The January 1 date of the Emancipation Proclamation is already a holiday. Well, how about September 22, the date Abraham Lincoln signed the executive order? Too close to Labor Day holiday? Not much closer than Juneteenth to the Fourth of July holiday. We know, of course, that the reason couldn’t be because Lincoln was a Republican. Then how about December 18th, when the thirteenth amendment became the law of the land. Oh no, too close to Christmas.
When all is said and done, our politicians believe us average citizens just don’t need to know the real reason why a relatively unknown date was rushed into being a federal holiday just a week before being celebrated. While we are nowhere as brilliant and clever as our elected leaders, we are left understanding that it is all about the usual culprits: racism, handouts, vote buying, re-elections, and the pure power of political expediency that swirls in the Washington ‘Swamp’. In other words, just shut up and enjoy the freebie our generous benefactors in Washington have doled out to us.
Just one more thing if I may be permitted to ask. Even us deplorables are glad slavery was abolished, and have no problem with celebrating a day of recognition – though it does seem to present another separation issue between blacks and whites. But why does it have to be a paid national holiday for two million federal workers? Would the day be meaningless if people had to work, and the federal government continued to operate? Does the importance of the commemoration depend entirely on how much money is expended for its observance?
According to the article I read, Congress says it will cost the taxpayers 600 million dollars to give everyone the day off. In other words, as a business owner and taxpayer I must pay taxes so that all federal workers can have a day off, while I work and receive no benefit for my expenditure. I admit that I don’t know the joys of a paid holiday since I have never had one, but I do know what national holidays mean to a business person who is regulated by the federal government.
In the first place the figure of $600 million is a joke. Nothing in government ever costs what it is reported to cost, and no ordinary taxpayer will ever know the true cost of any government expenditure. If the swamp admits to $600 million, then the actual number is undoubtedly in the billions.
Then, if you are in a business that requires constant contact with federal regulators like farming or fishing, just try to get something done that week. Federal holidays are the perfect time for employees to use their personal days or accumulated vacation time. In other words, as with all holidays, there is a drastic drop in productivity within all federal agencies for the entire week. Try putting a dollar amount on that.
Then of course, federal holidays spill over into state and local government probably ensuring that another 20 million employees will have a holiday also. How much will that cost? But wait, that’s not all. Now my employees along with all other private sector employees demand the holiday for themselves. After all, if federal offices are closed along with banks and many other businesses critical to daily functioning, it’s only fair that they should also have the free day.
There are also people who cannot be given the day off like waste management personnel, truck drivers, and transportation workers. Guess what? Unions demand holiday pay for all including those who were scheduled to be off on the holiday. When you add in incidental millions in expenditures for staging celebratory events, advertising, and contracted public programing, one can only think of long gone Senator Everett Dirksen opining “a billion here and a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking about real money”.
Well, never-mind. It is all part of the new awakening in America, where white privileged Americans must be constantly beat over the head for the slavery that existed in America and the world over seven generations ago. Only a true racist would complain about the expenditure of a few piddling billions for such a worthy celebration.
The entire political charade is just another example of the perfidious siren call of the Washington ‘swamp’. Democrats and Republicans alike, slide into the Capitol and spend billions and trillions of our hard-earned money out of political expediency, and then have the audacity to beg us for contributions to their re-election campaigns.
