I saw this photo and cap­tion in The Wash­ing­ton Post today.

With­out even get­ting into the shit storm that Gov­er­nor Sny­der has cre­ated in Michi­gan, the sen­ti­ment he expressed here touched a nerve.

I tend to be very lit­eral, so I need to first say that I should be will­ing to give a lit­tle here. The idea of approach­ing being elected rep­re­sen­ta­tives as if they were in the cus­tomer ser­vice indus­try has some appeal. Treat the elec­torate like cus­tomers of Nord­strom. Greet me. Ask what I need. Do every­thing you can to ensure that I get what I need and have a pleas­ant expe­ri­ence. Walk around from behind the counter and hand me my bag full of goods, and wish me well.

The prob­lem, though, is that too many elected offi­cials do look at the peo­ple that elected them into office as cus­tomers. Maybe it’s seman­tics to some, but I don’t like this phras­ing. I am not a cus­tomer (of the city, state, or coun­try) — I’m an owner. A share­holder. The boss. My tax dol­lars pay the bills and, by exten­sion, the salaries of elected offi­cials. The idea that I am a cus­tomer some­how rel­e­gates me to accept­ing the ser­vice offered. I think this idea needs to be com­pletely flipped on its head, and Gov­er­nor Sny­der, and oth­ers, need to real­ize that they are employ­ees — cus­to­di­ans at best. Shift­ing the mind­set of us, cit­i­zens, as cus­tomers, wait­ing on ser­vice, to being the boss, owner or stew­ard of the coun­try — clearly defin­ing the pri­or­i­ties for the employ­ees to carry out — is an impor­tant one.

Again, I get the metaphor of pro­vid­ing cus­tomer ser­vice, but hav­ing worked in pol­i­tics and gov­ern­ment for over 20 years, it has become clear to me that far too many elected offi­cials see them­selves as the boss, not the staff. We need to fix that per­cep­tion and real­ity. It will take work, though. A lot of peo­ple seem all too happy to hand over the keys to the store, if you will, and let the elected offi­cials do what they think is best. We have to be more active, and hold our offi­cials account­able. Account­able to explain what’s hap­pen­ing. Account­able to explain how our money is being spent.

This is not a rant directed at Repub­li­cans. Democ­rats are just cul­pa­ble. Irre­spec­tive of polit­i­cal party/affiliation, we can­not sit back and leave gov­ern­ing to whims of politi­cians. This is a rep­re­sen­ta­tive gov­ern­ment, and it is time that we clar­ify that we are not the cus­tomers of elected offi­cials. We are their bosses.