I heard somewhere the a state in our Union was having budget troubles, and all government offices had to shut down until a budget could be approved by the ruling body. Before this, partisan officials announced the the other party was impeding progress in the "budget talks" and leading the state to a government shutdown STATE OF EMERGENCY (emphasis mine).

I have been through one of these EMERGENCIES...I think it was in Ohio. What really happened in this state? Absolutely nothing. It made me think about what government really does on a day by day basis that we really don't or shouldn't need.

It seems to me vast resources are spent on regulating our actions, not providing governance. We have to admit, we are a country of excess. We all want the biggest, best, fastest, noisiest, best-tasting of everything. Why not? We worked hard for it, didnt we? Did we? If I can pay for it, why can't I have it? Can we really pay for all we have? DO we really pay for all we have? How much money is spent by the IRS just tracking down cheaters? How much time is spent by Medicare administration in identifying fraudulent billing? Why does the Unemployment Office spend so much time making sure you are looking for a job when you are unemployed? How many people receive money from the government when they don't need it, just because they can...and how much effort does it take to crack down on this?

There is a staggering amount of government regulation and expense that exists just because we are lazy, cheat, smoke, drive fast, don't care about our kids, keep our houses at 65 degrees in the summer, keep our houses 75 degrees in the winter, and drive ourselves down the block in our Hummer.

We don't need our government to tell us these things, do we?

Why can't we do things for ourselves? Why, for crying out loud, does our government have to tell you to stop smoking?

OK, before anyone goes into Al Gore Mode on me...I will declare that I drive a Jeep that gets 18 MPG, and my wife drives an SUV (not a Hummer) that gets better mileage than that with two kids. We keep our thermostat at 68 in the winter, and 77 in the summer during the day, 74 at night. I stop the shower water when I lather up, I don't smoke, and I wear my seat belt.