Message to Winners on Election Day - You Work For Us...

The following is a column by Charles M. Madigan of the Chicago Tribune published in today's paper.

Instead of reaching out and wagging my finger at potential voters, which is a civic duty cliche many columnists turn to on Election Day, I would like to reach out to the people who will finish as winners with a simple message.

You work for me.

Actually, you work for us, the people of this nation, all races, creeds, types, however you want to describe them. It is one of the only political systems in the world that allows the grand mass at the bottom to play the role of boss.

Therefore, I believe we should be taken more seriously.

I'm not one of those characters who thinks political description defines whether you are OK or not. But I have to say if you are one of those Washington Republicans of a certain parasitic stripe these days, you are not OK with me and probably not OK with many of your bosses across the country.

It's not the ideology or the party label that's a problem. It's the behavior.

It seems to me that you have been selling the store over the last few years and it's time for that to stop. I would rather you pay attention to the needs, longings and demands of the masses than the needs, longings and demands of the connected scavengers on K Street, or down in Springfield on that end of things too.

You know who you are in most cases.

I would like to redefine "special interest" for you.

It's me! I'm a special interest, and so is almost everyone else I know. We have our needs and it's time for you to start paying serious attention to them, for a change.

I would like to be able to go to sleep at night feeling certain that you are not involved in a conspiracy to take everything lovely, everything wild, everything wonderful about my country and hand it over to those who would pump, slash, mine, drill and suck every last ounce of glory from it as quickly as they can.

Call me a wild-eyed conservationist, but there you are. It's what I want.

If that means we are just going to have fewer cars, or smaller cars that run on restaurant waste or hydrogen or processed prairie grasses, so be it. It's a good trade-off. I am not yet a geezer but I am headed in that direction, and I don't want my declining years to be defined by our connection to Middle Eastern oil pushers who would just as well see us wiped off the map.

I also don't want you in my house, in particular, in my bedroom, or on my phone line.

What happens in bedrooms is not the business of the government, it's the business of consenting adults. Perhaps you and your church pals think you can find some clarity on this in the Bible, but I would suggest that is not the case. Don't forget, Lot offered his virgin daughters to the horny masses of Sodom in his bid to protect some angels from assault.

I don't think that's good role modeling.

I could say lots more about biblical sex, but it's a good book so why risk banning?

One of the most special interests I would like to bring into play is the American soldier.

I think our soldiers have done a spectacular job in a hopeless war that started out with a big lie and just declined from there. For that reason alone, a lot of you should be out of work by the end of the day.

For those who remain, we in management trust you will start taking this seriously and find a way to get them the hell out of there. You should do what you can as lawmakers to force change in the Bush administration to bring this adventure to an effective end.

The popular solution is to recommend the dismissal of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. That's a straw man. The problem is not Rumsfeld, it is, once again, being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The whole Iraq mess started with a collection of fabrications, it might as well end on one. Why don't we just conclude the Iraqis are at least as capable of being targets in this situation as we are, declare their competence and start pulling out?

That can't be any more fictional than weapons of mass destruction, can it?

Once we find a way to do that, let's not forget the troops. We in management believe you owe them a huge debt, and they better be treated at least as well as CEOs at health spas.

There is more, of course, but this is enough for now.