Walter Patterson Herald ColumnistIf I could wave a magic wand and all politicians who had been in office for two terms or better would disappear, I would happily do the wave.  
Politicians, incompetent, greedy, egotistical, power hungry politicians have brought this great nation to its knees, and they are not finished.  Once these politicians become entrenched, they are almost impossible to remove from office even when they openly and regularly demonstrate their contempt for their constituents and  for the best  interests of this country.
Two examples of corrupt politicians, Democrats both, are Jon Corzine, a former U. S. Senator from New Jersey, and Rod “Blago” Blagojevich, the former governor of Illinois.  “Blago” was just sentenced to 14 years in prison for attempting to sell Barack Obama’s senate seat to the highest bidder.  Jon Corzine, a thief who would make Bernie Madoff look like a small time pick-pocket, has ripped his clients off for nearly $200 million dollars, and no one knows where the money went.  Corzine, once he had left the U. S. Senate and the governorship of New Jersey formed M. F. Global, an investment company, hired former President Bill Clinton as an advisor, and then proceeded to bankrupt the company leaving its investors penniless. Although “Blago” has received jail time, Corzine will never serve a day in jail, and that is unfortunate.  For some reason, “Blago” didn’t have the “juice” to stay out of jail; Corzine does.
As a side note, “Blago” has now been sentenced to federal prison.  He knows more than he has thus far told.  Unless his life has been threatened and he believes that if he talks, bad things will happen to him, he will shortly begin to “sing like a bird.”  It will be interesting to see what new revelations come from the “Blago.”
Clinton, for all his helpful advice, was paid $50,000 a month for his expertise that apparently sent the company into bankruptcy, yet Clinton’s name is barely mentioned.
We live at a time in our history where corruption in government is so wide-spread that even with a change in administrations, it may take years to repair the damage and prosecute all of the people who have had their unethical and dishonest hands in the till.  
Take Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, for example.  These two entities bear much of the responsibility for the financial mess we are in today.  They were propped up by the federal government at tax payers’ expense.  Barney Frank, the head of the Banking and Finance Committee in Congress, refused to entertain any thought that Freddie and Fannie were in trouble.  
With his co-heart in the Senate, Christopher Dodd, they refused to allow the Bush Administration to make the necessary changes to rein in these out-of-control institutions even though Bush warned them no less than 17 times that trouble was on the horizon.
An on the spot witness to this corruption who will testify in federal court has stated, “Remember the Fannie and Freddie junkets they had in Chicago that people were upset about the $600,000 they spent.  Freddie and Fannie were there, and they might as well have set up a carnival booth.  I mean they were so excited about the fact that if you were a new mortgage business and you could get a wholesale line of credit, you could rapid rescore and qualify 500,000 people in a year, and they would back and buy everything you could send them.” Bad credit, no credit, bankrupt, it didn’t matter.
“Rapid rescore” of an applicant’s credit would get them the home of their dreams – but leave the taxpayers on the hook for the mortgage.  Do the words “financial meltdown” come to mind?
Government is too big.  It is too corrupt.  It is led by corrupt politicians who care more for their own futures than the future of this great country.  
Yet, in a speech in Osawatomie, Kansas, Barack Obama, in the most blatant “class warfare” speech I have ever heard an American president give, wants the government to grow bigger – and more powerful.  He wants some unknown bureaucrat in Washington to have total control over your life.  He wants a bureaucracy to control the economic future of this country, not market capitalism.  He declared that “rugged individualism” is a thing of the past, and looking out for one’s own self-interest is no longer an option.
We know that socialism does not work.  It has never worked.  In fact, it has destroyed the lives of millions of innocent people.  Europe is one step away from bankruptcy.
What you see in Europe today is what America will be like in three to five years if Obama gets his way.  In his Osawatomie speech, he declared that socialism is the course he will pursue.  
If he succeeds, America will have morphed into something that most of us will not recognize. His “transforming of America” will be complete.