In 2007, I was called into a meeting with the publisher and not one but three HR reps, one local, one regional and one corporate, to be told that I was being laid off.
I had worked in that building for that company for 20 years, learned every aspect of the business, and went to work with pride every day knowing that I was making that newspaper the best it could be.
Still, there was someone else that also had my qualifications, and under the guise of downsizing to deal with declining revenue, the publisher picked the new guy.
Like anyone else in that position, business being off was an indictment of the poor leadership, but that was a thought I kept to myself (hey, every disgruntled employee harbors that same sentiment. Many of you know what I’m talking about). A long time ago, my dad told me something very profound about working: If you’re not driving the train, you’re just along for the ride.
Basically, your employment is at the mercy (or whim) of the powers that be.
So when I watch what’s happening on the national scene, I see many public and private citizens making hay over the Trump Administration dumping Attorney General Pam Bondi, and earlier this year DHS Secretary Kristi Noem. The people speaking are saying Trump is a failure because his people are failures.
For my money, those people gotta pump the brakes.
When I was laid off, I would have hated it if my situation was subject to national dissemination. Not because I’m shy, but because I looked at my layoff as my failure. Plus, and here’s the crux of things, it was a decision that was made for the betterment of the company, and how I felt about it didn’t matter.
Bondi and Noem, for whatever reason, were asked to leave. This is the way; if your supervisor, boss, the president, et al, feel that the job you’re doing isn’t rising to expectation, then you are replaced. Quod erat demonstrandum.
Many have used the fact that President Trump is simply a failed reality show host. Yet on his shows, he gave tasks, evaluated results, and then cut the least effective person loose. That how it works in every level of society.
Except one: the federal government.
Sure, the appointees can and do get shuffled in and out based on a variety of factors, such as new elected officials, but removing the minions is a whole different ball game. Removing elected officials or judges — two of the three branches of government — is nigh impossible.
Sure, there are elections, every two years for House members and every six years for senators, but short of them retiring or behaving so heinously that there is no other option, those folks are pretty much guaranteed lifetime employment.
Presidents can only serve two terms of four years. That’s codified into law. Yet the halls of Congress are populated by essentially the elected undead. According to a quick internet search that I tossed together, there are 10 members of Congress that have served 40 to 50 years. In 1975, the national debt was $533 billion; now it’s $39 trillion. In 1975, the cost of gas (when you could still get regular gas before the EPA brownshirts got hold of it) $1.74; in 2025, it was $3.10. The Vietnam War ended in 1975; the U.S. in bombing the snot out of Iran now.
While the president, you know, the guy who only can serve eight years, nominates people to fill judicial positions, it’s up to the wizened and well-preserved senators to say bless that union, and then it’s till death do they part.
So, if our elected officials are not performing to our expectations, or judges are in essence practicing social justice instead of actual law, what recourse is there?
For judges, sad to say, there is only the impeachment process — a majority vote in the House to impeach and a two-thirds vote in the Senate to convict.
For House and Senate members, there seems only to be elections. Sure, there is an impeachment process for them as well, but the problem here is that the elected officials determine if there is the need for impeachment. They have, through legislation, practice, policy and custom, pretty much guaranteed themselves employment forever (I say this because in most cases, the incumbent official always has the advantage in elections).
But that’s backwards; in my case listed earlier, that would be me saying that I will not be laid off regardless of what my employers or the company expects. The company doesn’t work for me.
But Congress does.
So here’s my thought: there needs to be a real mechanism in place, other than regularly scheduled elections, for us to be able to deal with our representatives and judges should they perform below our expectations. It should be easier to recall an official when they vote against the will of the people they supposedly represent.
In the current push, the sloth-like move to gather together to let us regular people make changes to the government, there’s talk of term limits and such. I’m wondering, though, if we could at the state level enact rules that would allow local governments to call federal representatives and senators on the carpet.
I’m sure it would be a fight, but for too long the people supposedly acting on our behalf have felt they were elected to run our lives at every level instead of running the government.
Tony Farkas is editor of the Trinity County News-Standard and the San Jacinto News-Times. He can be reached at tony@polkcountypublishing.com.
