Why not have public referendums on every issue? Americans seem to want them. Gay civil rights were set back last year by public referendums in both California and Maine. (At Right: I have not read and cannot given an endorsement to the book at right, but its title is an eye catcher for our times.)

Now a group in Washington DC wants a public referendum to give the city's voters a chance to weigh in on gay marriage which was passed by its board and signed by its mayor.

Okay, let's have national public referendum on everything that any group does not like. Let's start with the laws that the US Congress has passed. Polls show that nearly 70% of Americans wanted a public option plan that the US Congress refused to pass. Had that issue gone to a national referendum, Congress could have taken their holiday break a month earlier, and a national health care program would now be the law of the land.

A public referendum would have gotten out of Viet Nam before 65,000 American young people died there while US Businesses and CEOs collected millions making weapons. A public referendum would have pulled us out of Iraq where we have hemorrhaged two billion dollars a week since 2003, bankrupting our nation in the process, and we are still there as well as in Afghanistan.

It seems the only time Americans clamor for a public vote on an issue is when there is a chance to sock it to gay people.

NOTE: Speaking of the US Congress, did any of our US men over sixty five notice that their Social Security Check would not receive a cost of living increase this year? Did everyone else notice that the US Congress voted themselves a $5,000 pay raise increase? Wouldn't it be great to have a job where you could ignore the wishes of your boss (the voters) and give yourself a $5,000 raise anytime you felt like it?