Letter: If I were a politician

Yacolt resident Mark Rose explains how he would fleece American taxpayer

Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in this letter to the editor are those of the author alone and may not reflect the editorial position of ClarkCountyToday.com

If I were a politician… If I were a master of the public trust, I wouldn’t need to rob banks or burgle homes. I wouldn’t need to run a business or build a product. I would want to engulf the whole system in a fog of benevolence, where every dollar spent was a virtue and every question asked was a sin.

If I were a politician, I’d set about, however necessary, to take over the treasury of the United States, state by state, city by city.

I’d begin with a campaign of compassion. With the wisdom of a serpent, I would whisper to you: “We just need a little more funding to help the vulnerable.”

If I were a politician, I’d invite the homeless to come to my city. I would declare a state of emergency, not to solve the problem, but to suspend the rules. I’d pass laws to divert hundreds of millions of dollars to their care, all the while pocketing the political capital from the vendors I enrich. I would create a “homelessness crisis” that becomes a mechanism for the unchecked distribution of cash to favored non-profits and subcontractors, with minimal verification of services rendered.¹ I would make sure that the more money we spent, the worse the problem got, ensuring my job was never finished.

If I were a politician, I would look at the schools. I wouldn’t worry about test scores or literacy; I’d worry about the payroll. I would infuse billions of dollars into the K-12 system under the guise of “for the children,” but I’d make sure that money flowed directly into salary increases that inflate union dues. Then, I would become the recipient of 98% of their political donations.²

I’d create a perfect, closed loop where the state funds the union’s operations, the union funds the politicians, and the politicians increase the state funding. I’d lobby to remove caps on local levies, allowing school districts to tax property owners even more heavily for salaries and cost-of-living adjustments that outpace the private sector.³ I would offer grants for “professional development” programs run by the very unions that keep me in office, turning the tax code into a tithe for my reelection.

If I were a politician, I’d welcome the world—literally. I would allocate tens of millions of dollars to house migrants in commercial hotels, often at premium rates, transforming the hospitality industry into a ward of the state.⁴ I’d create programs like the “Apple Health Expansion,” a fully state-funded Medicaid-like program for undocumented adults funded entirely by Washington state taxpayers. I’d watch it reach its enrollment cap of 13,000 individuals almost immediately upon launch,⁵ knowing that providing free or subsidized high-quality healthcare to undocumented migrants acts as a powerful magnet, increasing the burden on state infrastructure while the native-born population struggles with inflation and tax hikes.⁶

And when the people started to ask questions? If I were a politician, I would have a ready-made defense.

When citizen journalists uncovered ghost businesses and empty buildings, I wouldn’t investigate. I would open daycare centers that exist only on paper. And when the cameras showed up to find empty rooms where children were supposed to be,⁷ I would issue statements condemning the investigations as “harassment” and “hate.”⁸ I would weaponize the language of tolerance to protect the machinery of theft. I would use the cry of racism to shield a system that fleeces the taxpayer, knowing that most people are too polite to push back.

I would make sure that local voices didn’t get in the way of my grand designs. If smaller, more conservative cities tried to vote against my expensive light rail projects or my tolling schemes, I wouldn’t win the argument; I’d change the rules. I would restructure the C-TRAN board to diminish the voting power of those smaller cities, ensuring that the urban political machine could steamroll the rural dissenters.⁹ I would consolidate power until the only votes that counted were the ones I controlled.

If I were a politician, I would turn the federal government into a vehicle for funneling cash to NGOs that support progressive causes, feeding USAID into a wood chipper of ideology rather than aid.¹⁰ I would create a Department of Government Efficiency only to mock it, knowing that my “efficiency” is measured in how quickly I can move money from your pocket to my friends.

I would take from those who work and give to those who organize. I would caution against “austerity” and “accountability.” I would convince the young that government is the only solution and the old that they can’t survive without me.

In other words, if I were a politician, I’d just keep right on doing what they’re doing.

Good day.

Mark Rose
Yacolt