The political reality of today is one party, period.

It is the party of incumbenc. The party of self-promotion and self-preservation. Service to our government was never supposed to be a glorious life. Sustaining one’s image and importance appears to have taken precedence over issues important to constituents.

If this were not the case, long ago, in the 1970s, we would have had a national energy strategy and program to curb dependence on foreign oil; taken measures to protect the coffers of Social Security and Medicare from the whims of other governmental programs to keep them forever sustainable; and addressed the immigration concerns by states and citizens bordering our southwest that are not new and enforcing federal laws on the books that would have prevented the challenges illegals present to us today.

Balanced budget amendments should have been legislated at the state and federal levels to curb excessive government spending.

Today’s total lack of bipartisan agreement or issues critical to Americans to promote party line unity is appalling and unacceptable.

No amount of impassioned rhetoric by candidates in the coming November election is cause for our complacency in understanding just who and what we are voting for. It is time that those whom we vote into political office resemble those who voted them in, not what a majority or minority leader needs them to be.

Norman Zanetti

Pinehurst