Do as I say, not as I do...

This is precisely one of the top ten things wrong with Amerka (U.S.A.) today: The notion that rules and the law is for everyone else, but never for "me."

Seems like everyone in some way seems to think they're above it (the law or the rules). Granted not everyone is a Kenneth Lay, Jack Abramov, Tom Delay or Bush/Cheney. Those guys are all obvious and there's far more like them than you can possibly imagine. (Follow the money. Find great wealth or power, and I'd bet if you had the time and/or resources you'd statistically stand a good chance of finding some rules or laws that have been "bent" or "interpreted differently." Human history validates that point all to well; why would our era be any different.) Feeling "above it all" at that level is nothing new. But now it's pervasive. Think about yourself. Never parked in a handicap space with a sticker that wasn't yours? Never sped down the freeway, because, well, you were just going with the flow of traffic? Never went through the express line knowing full well you had more than 15 items? Sure these are small things (and easy to rationalize), but every time you overstep one of these "little" rules or "rise above" any law, no matter how major or minor, you are entering this realm of the "self-important" and the entitled. You are then acting as if the rules or laws are for everyone else but not you and you are furthermore likely as not violating any sense of what is either courteous or civil or just or in the interest of the common good or some combination thereof. And that becomes just another destructive blow to the notion of a civilized** culture. Some blows are smaller than others, true, but they are blows nonetheless.

Oh, and keep an eye on your legislators. What you don't see can hurt you.



**showing evidence of moral and intellectual advancement; humane, ethical, and reasonable; marked by refinement in taste and manners; cultured; polished.