People who choose Public Service as a Career

In the current hue and cry against people who are in the employ of tax payers, otherwise known as public  servants (this is a cycle that occurs about every 20 years-I'm on the downhill side of the mountain and my memory is long), let us please remember that people who choose to serve in their local, state, or federal governments in any public capacity also PAY TAXES and SPEND THEIR INCOME.  Public employees, in effect, pay their own salaries. 

Public servants get married, have children, buy food and clothing, travel, celebrate holidays . . . just like everybody else.  They are not sitting in a rarified atmosphere getting rich off tax payer's money, believe me.  Our current inability to accept the fact that taxes need to be raised will hurt us in the long run. 

That first call to the police department or fire department . . . minutes, hours tick by . . . as we wait, or visiting the local library, only to find the hours have been shortened,, or a service we counted on is no longer available.  The Tea Party and their ilk want something for nothing;  the fact is if everybody gives a little, everybody gets a lot.

As to the current collective bargaining broohaha in Wisconsin:  public servants deserve collective bargaining.  They are public SERVANTS, people, not public SLAVES. Actually, anyone who works deserves collective bargaining.

I'm a big believer in a rising tide lifts all boats and when everybody does better, EVERYBODY DOES BETTER.

It seems like periodically the citizens of the United States of America are asked, by events, to decide if we are, in fact, the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, or a bunch of separate individuals who happen to live in this country known as the USA.   United we succeed, separately we fail.