An Open Letter To Our Nation's Leadership
(aka Glenn Beck: “The
Letter”)
by Glenn Beck and Janet Contreras
June 17, 2009 - 10:36 ET
GLENN BECK: I got a
letter from a woman named Janet Contreras in Arizona. She writes an open letter to our nation's leadership:
JANET CONTRERAS: I'm
a home grown American citizen, 53, registered Democrat all my life. Before the last presidential election I
registered as a Republican because I no longer felt the Democratic Party
represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. Now I no longer feel the Republican Party
represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me.
The fact is I no longer feel any political party or
representative in Washington represents my views or works to pursue the issues
important to me.
There must be someone.
Please tell me who you are.
Please stand up and tell me that you are there and that you're willing
to fight for our Constitution as it was written. Please stand up now.
You might ask yourself what my views and issues are that I
would horribly feel so disenfranchised by both major political parties. What kind of nut job am I? Will you please
tell me?
Well, these are briefly my views and issues for which I seek
representation:
One - Illegal Immigration
I want you to stop coddling illegal immigrants and secure
our borders. Close the underground
tunnels. Stop the violence and the
trafficking in drugs and people. No
amnesty, not again. Been there, done
that, no resolution.
P.S. I'm not a racist.
This isn't to be confused with legal immigration.
I want it repealed and I want no further funding supplied to
it. We told you no, but you did it
anyway. I want the remaining unfunded
95% repealed. Freeze, repeal.
I want the circumvention of our checks and balances stopped
immediately. Fire the czars. No more czars. Government officials answer to the process, not to the president. Stop trampling on our Constitution and honor
it.
The debate on global warming is not over. There is more to say.
I will not be rushed into another expensive decision. Don't you dare try to pass this in the
middle of the night and then go on break.
Slow down!
I want states rights and sovereignty fully restored. I want less government in my life, not
more. Shrink it down. Mind your own business. You have enough to take care of with your
real obligations. Why don't you start
there.
I do not want ACORN and its affiliates in charge of our 2010
census. I want them investigated. I also do not want mandatory escrow fees
contributed to them every time on every real estate deal that closes.
Stop the funding to ACORN and its affiliates pending
impartial audits and investigations. I
do not trust them with taking the census over with our taxpayer money. I don't
trust them with our taxpayer money. Face
up to the allegations against them and get it resolved before taxpayers get any
more involved with them.
If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, hello. Stop protecting your political buddies. You work for us, the people. Investigate.
No, no, no. I work
for my money. It is mine. I have always worked for people with more
money than I have because they gave me jobs. That is the only redistribution of wealth that I will support. I never got a job from a poor person. Why do you want me to hate my employers? Why ‑‑ what do you have against
shareholders making a profit?
Although I never got a job from a poor person, I have helped
many in need. Charity belongs in our
local communities, where we know our needs best and can use our local talent
and our local resources. Butt out,
please. We want to do it ourselves.
Ten - Corporate Bailouts.
Knock it off. Sink
or swim like the rest of us. If there
are hard times ahead, we'll be better off just getting into it and letting the
strong survive. Quick and painful. Have you ever ripped off a Band‑Aid? We will pull together. Great things happen in America under great
hardship. Give us the chance to
innovate. We cannot disappoint you more
than you have disappointed us.
How about it? No,
really, how about it? Let's have it. Let's say we give the buzzwords a rest and
have some straight honest talk. Please
try - please stop manipulating and trying to appease me with clever wording. I am not the idiot you obviously take me for.
Stop sneaking around and meeting in
back rooms making deals with your friends. It will only be a prelude to your criminal investigation. Stop hiding things from me.
Stop it now. Take a
breath. Listen to the people. Let's just slow down and get some input from
some nonpoliticians on the subject. Stop
making everything an emergency. Stop
speed reading our bills into law.
I am not an activist. I am not a community organizer. Nor am I a terrorist, a militant or a violent person.
I am a parent and a grandparent. I work. I'm busy. I'm busy. I am busy, and I am tired.
I thought we elected competent people to take care of the
business of government so that we could work, raise our families, pay our
bills, have a little recreation, complain about taxes, endure our hardships,
pursue our personal goals, cut our lawn, wash our cars on the weekends and be
responsible contributing members of society and teach our children to be the same
all while living in the home of the free and land of the brave.
I entrusted you with upholding the Constitution. I believed in the checks and balances to keep
from getting far off course. What
happened?
You are very far off course.
Do you really think I find humor in the hiring of a speed
reader to unintelligently ramble all through a bill that you signed into law
without knowing what it contained?
I do not.
It is a mockery of the responsibility I have entrusted to
you. It is a slap in the face. I am not laughing at your arrogance.
Why is it that I feel as if you would not trust me to make a
single decision about my own life and how I would live it but you should expect
that I should trust you with the debt that you have laid on all of us and our
children.
We did not want the TARP bill. We said no. We would
repeal it if we could. I am sure that
we still cannot. There is such urgency
and recklessness in all of the recent spending.
From my perspective, it seems that all of you have gone
insane.
I also know that I am far from alone in these feelings.
Do you honestly feel that your current pursuits have merit
to patriotic Americans? We want it to
stop. We want to put the brakes on
everything that is being rushed by us and forced upon us. We want our voice back.
You have forced us to put our lives on hold to straighten
out the mess that you are making. We
will have to give up our vacations, our time spent with our children, any
relaxation time we may have had and money we cannot afford to spend on you to
bring our concerns to Washington.
Our president often knows all the right buzzword is
unsustainable. Well, no kidding. How many tens of thousands of dollars did the
focus group cost to come up with that word? We don't want your overpriced words. Stop treating us like we're morons.
We want all of you to stop focusing on your reelection and
do the job we want done, not the job you want done or the job your party wants
done.
You work for us and at this rate I guarantee you not for
long because we are coming. We will be
heard and we will be represented.
You think we're so busy with our lives that we will never
come for you? We are the formerly
silent majority, all of us who quietly work, pay taxes, obey the law, vote,
save money, keep our noses to the grindstone and we are now looking up at you.
You have awakened us, the patriotic spirit so strong and so
powerful that it had been sleeping too long. You have pushed us too far.
Our numbers are great. They may
surprise you. For every one of us who
will be there, there will be hundreds more that could not come.
Unlike you, we have their trust. We will represent them honestly, rest assured. They will be at the polls on voting day to
usher you out of office.
We have cancelled vacations. We will use our last few dollars saved. We will find the representation among us and a grassroots campaign
will flourish.
We didn't ask for this fight. But the gloves are coming off. We do not come in violence, but we are angry. You will represent us or you will be replaced
with someone who will. There are
candidates among us when he will rise like a Phoenix from the ashes that you
have made of our constitution.
Democrat, Republican, independent, libertarian. Understand this. We don't care.
Political parties are meaningless to us. Patriotic Americans are willing to do right
by us and our Constitution and that is all that matters to us now.
We are going to fire all of you who abuse power and seek
more. It is not your power. It is ours and we want it back. We entrusted you with it and you abused it.
You are dishonorable. You are dishonest. As
Americans we are ashamed of you. You
have brought shame to us.
If you are not representing the wants and needs of your
constituency loudly and consistently, in spite of the objections of your party,
you will be fired. Did you hear?
We no longer care about your political parties. You need to be loyal to us, not to them. Because we will get you fired and they will
not save you.
If you do or can represent me, my issues, my views, please
stand up. Make your identity known. You need to make some noise about it. Speak up. I need to know who you are.
If you do not speak up, you will be herded out with the rest
of the sheep and we will replace the whole damn congress if need be one by one.
We are coming. Are
we coming for you? Who do you
represent? What do you represent?
Listen. Because we
are coming. We the people are coming.
Click
here to go to part 2 of this story, an interview with the author, Janet
Contreras.
Sign the petition: An open letter to
our nation's leadership