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Are you tired of career politicians in Washington, D.C.?

At the upcoming Freeborn County Fair there will be a booth for Convention of States (COS). COS is a clause found in Article V of the United States Constitution. Article V deals solely with the amendment process. So far, all prior amendments were initiated by Congress. COS bypasses Congress. They have no say in the language of the proposed amendment nor do they vote on it. There are three potential amendments, but one would put term limits on all members in Congress and potentially the bureaucrats as well.

Considering the power at stake, naturally there is some opposition to the COS movement. You will find some opposition in both political parties. The opponents will use terms like “runaway convention.” This term is used solely to instill fear within a person’s psyche.

The human brain is divided into two parts — the emotional and the logical. Over the past 20-plus years, too often Americans have fallen prey to being influenced by the emotional part of the brain. The Y2K hysteria convinced many people to run out and by generators, bottled water and some to dig bomb shelters. All based on the fear that our computer systems would not be able to handle a four-digit year. It turned out to be a big “nothing burger.”

In 2008, we were scared into believing the worst economic conditions in our history would happen if we didn’t “bail out” the banks. The result was Congress took money from the competent and gave it to the incompetent so the incompetent could compete with the competent. How incompetent was that?

We are all familiar with the quote; “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” I like this quote. There is a lot of wisdom to it. Unfortunately it hasn’t had any practical application for at least 20 years. To fit modern times, it needs to be updated to “the only thing we have to fear is people who play on our fears.” How many times have you heard someone say, “so and so took advantage of me by playing on my logic”? It’s probably zero. But how many time have your heard someone say, “so and so took advantage of me by playing on my emotions?”

If you want to potentially put an end to career politicians in Washington, D.C., please visit the COS booth in the Grandstand. You can visit anytime between noon and 8 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday or between noon and 4 p.m. on Sunday. You will be given details on the process and a simple thing that you can do to help amend our Constitution to put term limits on Congress.

Wayne Prudoehl

Albert Lea