When I was 9 years old my grandfather told me that years ago the leadership in this country was respected no matter who was in office. You respected the president because he was the president.

There was a certain integrity that the office of a president, senator or congressman held. Of course he was part of the Greatest Generation. He fought as a frogman in Guam, Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Things were different then. The world has “moved on,” as Stephen King might have put.

My grandfather tried to explain to me how things are different now. No more respect for the office. With such horrible debacles like LBJ and Nixon, the American people began to lose confidence . . . lose hope. I was a little young to understand it at that point. But I do now.

What happens when the government no longer represents the people? Well, in their eyes absolutely nothing changes. They are so blinded by the bribery of their sacred lobbyists and by their own $pecial interests that they neither can, nor want to, see what is in the best interest of the American people. The American Dream is no longer accessible.

This is the analogy; at least the best one that I can come up with. Imagine yourself on a ship. A big one, maybe a four-star ocean liner. The ship is our great country. Its destination is the American Dream. You have all of the knowledge and willpower to drive this massive entity to its destination. However, you trust the wheel to the captain and his shipmates.

One night while you are asleep, you hear the captain come over the intercom saying that there is a massive iceberg dead ahead and there is no way to avoid it. All passengers must abandon ship. You grab a lifeboat. All of the other passengers follow suit.

Once you get into the lifeboat you realize that it has no oars. You look dead ahead of the ship and see no iceberg. But damnit! You are in the middle of the Atlantic and the tide is taking you straight toward the

malaria-infested jungles of West Africa. You sob as you see the ship move straight against the tide toward the luxurious city of Nice, France.

What are you to do now? You could’ve taken control of the ship. You think to yourself, “I should’ve seen this coming!” But now they’re headed straight toward the nude beaches of paradise and you’re headed straight for the armpit of the world. Start kickin’!

There are a myriad of issues facing this nation that neither the congress nor the president want to acknowledge. 85 percent of all Americans are against the current guest-worker program that the president and the senate have in mind. Nearly everyone I know was against the selling out of our ports to an outfit out of the U.A.E., a nation that still recognizes the Taliban.

My analogy is slowly coming true. Democrats and Republicans alike no longer represent the American people.

Thanks Captain Georgie-Boy! And thank you too Billy Bob Frist!