Mayor Tom McMahon says: My first career was as a Peace Corps Volunteer teacher in Bangladesh, where I also had the opportunity to observe third world politics in action.
Third World Politics
My first career was as a Peace Corps Volunteer teacher in Bangladesh, where I also had the opportunity to observe third world politics in action.
I watched political structures being formed in Bangladesh (then East Pakistan), after achieving independence from Britain and shortly thereafter being torn from India by religious zealots on both sides of a border.
They labeled each other, and fought one another on philosophical grounds. Meanwhile, back at the villages, (where the welfare of the people was at stake day to day), nothing was done to address the real problems of a new nation.
Opportunists stepped forward to help… (themselves, at it turned out).
The political pendulum swung from democracy, to martial law, back partially to “representative democracy”, where selected “qualified” voters (who happened also to be males, land owners or in influential positions) were the only ones allowed to vote, then back to martial law again (close to a dictatorship).
Meanwhile, the educational system handed to them by the British was suffering, the road and railroad infrastructure was deteriorating, health care was becoming almost non-existent… and the politicians fiddled.
Fast forward to a city (Reading, PA) that is trying to heal itself after massive job loss and declining neighborhoods; a school system in financial distress trying to remediate students who come ill-prepared to learn, increasing enrollments, and fighting against all odds to be successful in the brave new world of “no-child left behind”.
And the politicians fiddle.
Political parties of all kinds rely on labels to trounce each other (liberal, conservative, born-again, leftist, rightist… ad nauseum). Enough already!
This city and this school district needs men and women of character, who have value systems that move a community forward, who are willing to compromise, and who are willing to get involved in the messy business of governing.
I don’t disparage full time politicians, but my mentors are the framers of the declaration of Independence and the writers of the constitution, who for the most part, had real jobs before they stepped forward to serve as elected officials.
This community needs no more division, and we need everyone to step up and help (not just themselves). I care not if you are Democrat, Republican, Green Party or Libertarian in your philosophy of life.
I need people to read books to kids, to mentor them, to help clean up their block, to help me bring jobs to the city, to renovate homes in tough neighborhoods.
Bring me your tired, your poor, your wealthy and your hard workers of all political persuasions who want to pitch in and work everyday to make this place better.
Let those with single interest “party politics” and stilted agendas join the naysayers picnic down by the river.
The rest of us have work to do.
