While I would like to think that my job is “essential,” I am all too painfully aware of how “inherently” un-important my job actually is----if----you look at it from the stand point of the Market Place.
While I would like to think that my job is inherently important, I know that I really only have a job because people call me for an inspection. If they stop calling----I have no job.
I would love to think that people would call me to have their homes inspected just because I can provide them with really valuable information----even when they aren’t selling or buying. But the reality is that these types of inspections make up about 5% of my inspections. The rest are in some way involved with Real Estate sales.
If the economy were to really tank-----I mean really tank-----like Déjà-Hooverville all over again-----I would be at the head of the bread lines. 
I find this particularly distressing because it is during difficult times that people tend to get the most “inventive” when it comes to patching things together----just to get a little more life out of whatever is broken, or to create “homemade” versions of the real thing. This translates to even more people being put in jeopardy from those "creations" and more personal tragedy is the end result.
Add to this----that people in difficult times are also in an even worse position financially to get those repairs done. This is just more incentive for them to NOT call us.
We have created a lot of things in our society to protect ourselves and improve the quality of our lives-----if those things can’t be maintained, replaced or serviced, we are actually in worse condition than if we had never had those things in the first place. There remains the “perception” of safety----the memory of how safe those things used to make us feel (I won’t go into how much of this is also an illusion).
Can you imagine how many bad GFCI’s there would be with no Home Inspectors doing their thing for ten years? How about no street lights because municipalities could not afford to keep the bulbs burning or replaced? Would people EVER get their furnaces serviced and chimneys cleaned? Would people ever change the batteries in their smoke alarm/detectors if they couldn’t afford batteries? And wouldn’t these safety devices be even more important as people jury-rigged wood burning appliances out of oil drums and drainage pipe?
While I like to entertain myself with notions of: “It can never get that bad,” I am also aware that it certainly can. Anyone that is not willing to do what it takes to pull our collective heads out of the sand (or less euphemistic places)-----are really going to be part of the problem as opposed to part of the solution. If ever there was a time for allowing those that we appointed to lead us----and to do just that----it would seem to be now. If ever there was a time for our leaders to do what they were elected to do----as opposed to what will get them re-elected----it would seem to be now.
I find it incredible that most politicians and their constituents forget what leaders are for.
Charles Buell
Click on the Rose 
to check out: AHA!---A Forum of Landmark Proportions---your Group
PS, for those of you that are new to my blog (or for some other "unexplained" reason have never noticed)
all
pictures and smiley-face inserts (emoticons) (when I use them) have
messages that show up when you point at them with your cursor.
DeCroe,
is my "etherial" home inspector assistant and occasionally flies into
my blog and other people's blogs to offer assistance. To find out more
about her beginnings just click on Raven.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Click on the Rose to check out: AHA!---A Forum of Landmark Proportions---your Group
PS, for those of you that are new to my blog (or for some other "unexplained" reason have never noticed)all pictures and smiley-face inserts (emoticons) (when I use them) have messages that show up when you point at them with your cursor.
My WORDLESS WEDNESDAY pictures and some selected POEMS & STORIES.
"I have news for the gang in Congress. We didn't elect you to sit on your asses and do nothing and remain silent while our democracy is being hijacked and our greatness is being replaced with mediocrity. What is everybody so afraid of? That some bonehead on Fox News will call them a name? Give me a break. Why don't you guys show some spine for a change?" Quoted by Lee Iacocca.
~ Life is Good
That about sums it up Roy:)
Charles, I have two comments. 1) Anybody that can pull Chrysler out of the hole they were in must be a very smart man. (Where is he when they need him again, oh) 2) To maintain power you either have to solve a problem or be perceived to be actively working on solving that problem. Of course, the solution isn't necessarily staying in power. Can you really borrow out of debt?
Jack, perhaps we need David Copperfield:)
wait, back to what Jack said- can we? Did I miss something? cw
I am afraid most of us have an aversion to "bitter pills." Hopefully someone will give them to us when we slip into our collective coma:)
I agree with you. They should stop voting down solutions because they are having to stick with their party. I finally understand what bipartisan means.
Some times the "checks and balances" need to be set aside before the balance point becomes a razor blade.
Charles, I'm not sure what the answer is, but it seems to me that they are working against each other. If I read this all properly the President came up with a package, then to appease his own party it was re-written to make it more appealing to his party. Then the republicans voted against it, but it pass the House because of Democratic party vote. Then the republicans came up with a plan that's supposed to be half the cost with more bang. Now the Democrats, not the President have yet another plan with even more pork. Am I just getting it all wrong, or is this what's happening?
Suesan, I am afraid it is like most of these kinds of monumental things that have to be done by the government that there is just no way for the general public to ever actually know what it means. In 25 years we may have an inkling of the "truth." Right now, the media and the government are both their own worst enemies with agendas that are rarely transparent. (and this is my "positive" take on it:)
Mr Charles,
I got my outfit from a cracker jacks box and I am ready to lead you. Are you ready to follow?
Nutsy
Nutsy, I think the outfit came with you in it.:)
Amen, Charlie...Amen!
Amen, Jim:)
The "leaders" are going to "lead" us alright.......right over a cliff. You all can drink the kool aid, I'm havin a beer.
Susan, I am afraid that even the beer is cool-aid flavored:)
The initial blog post was excellent, some of the comments are even better,
reading this made my day.
Kevin
Thanks for reading and commenting Kevin.
Charles - let's hear it for home inspectors!!
And, um, Lee who? Oh, you mean the guy who prevented us from getting seat belts for years because they were "too expensive?" And padded dashboards because they were "too expensive." And air bags because, well, because they were "too expensive?"
Oh, and then lobbied Congress for seat belts because they became politically correct?
Ditto air bags...
Oh, and padded dashes...
Thank goodness he is out there... there is more, but I haven't the time.
Well, he did leave us the Mustang (not named for the horse...)
Home inspectors have provided the public education that Congress never could. I don't want Congress to anyway... the camel was invented by Congress when committees tried to mimic a horse. They compromised with two models of camel...
P.s. We, the people, should be their leaders, NOT, NOT, NOT the other way around...
Just a thought...
Love, Thomas Jefferson
xxxooo
Jay, but camels can do things that horses can't:)
Are you saying that every decision for the "group" should be voted on by the group?
This is a great jib-jab--I'll be checking on this post often, Charles!
Susan, I hope that means you enjoyed it:)
Charles - Among my many influences molding my legal and political thought were those of Mr. Edmund Burke. Methinks it apropos to mention him, as he contributed greatly toward the construction of our Declaration and worthy Constitution. I believe it also to be inspired by God. As to representative democracy, he states simply:
" ...it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with him; their opinion, high respect; their business, unremitted [sic] attention. It is his duty to sacrifice his repose, his pleasures, his satisfactions, to theirs; and above all, ever, and in all cases, to prefer their interest to his own. Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion." The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke. Volume I (London: Henry G. Bohn, 1854), pp. 446-8.
That may not be his greatest work, but among them yes. He was quite in favor of what I proposed in the Declaration, but was hooted down by his brethren in Commons. Even his Whigs did not entirely understand his conservatism as regards our intentions toward the Crown. Their hoots helped us and our revolt!
He endeared himself to me when he was particularly in favor of one of my rapprochements in the Declaration, as regards King George III, in which I stated: "He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass [sic] our people, and eat out their substance."
I believe you find yourself in that same condition now, do you not Charles? The Congress no longer leads you - it tells you. I believe the word most used now is "mandate." And, unfunded mandates at that! Charles, I fear for you for that.
So, in answer to your question, no. The decisions for the "group" should be voted on by the representative of the group, one who represents their liberties, and does not tell them, stick by stick, what portion of their house will next be removed.
And, please, call me Tom.
Your most humble servant,
Tom
P.s. Jay has asked me to dispatch forward that when he wants a horse, a camel simply will not do! I am told you will understand what he means by that. I do not!
Why, pull my garter! The word I am to convey below to "Submit Comment" is "cinnamon!" Such is the color of my hair, well, I suppose it most honestly would be put, such was when in my youth.
Fare thee well, good Charles!
Ahhh, Mr Jefferson----you and your gang were such a hoot. I gotta say you got the job done and hopefully we won't mess with it too much more. I just wish there was a definitive way to tell the difference between what is in my best interest and our best interest. :)
Jay, while horses are all fine and dandy----we may be needing a camel to get us all the way across this wasteland:)
LIBERTY, my dear Charles, is my, yours and our best interest!! Excuse me while I go forth to harass and eat out more of Jay's substance. HA! HAH-HAH!! I so can, how do you now say, oh, I so can crack myself up!!
He agrees again, with you, by the way, as to this wasteland. But despair not! Even deserts can bloom like a rose - and that, my dear sir, takes the rugged individual, left unfettered, to act in his own best interests! Hurrah the individual! Why, there again, unwittingly too, has my prompting to conveyance from Jay lent an additional answer! Liberty, my dear friend, liberty!
Why, it seems once I heard that liberty was more valuable than death! 'Tis hard to comment now regarding death, given my current circumstance as it is now so found.
Mr Charles,
Some of my outfits come from cracker jacks boxes.
Nutsy
My Dear Steve, the squirell is very tired, and needs a rest.
Jay, I have to agree with you----there can be much beauty in the desert.
Nutsy, go hibernate.
Kevin, I think hibernation for a couple of years should do the trick.:)