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Responding To Responsibility's 'New Era'

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By TOM JACKSON

tjackson@tampatrib.com

Published: January 23, 2009

Sometimes, even that which is utterly obvious needs - indeed, deserves - flourishes of attention. Publicly praising a dutiful employee, for instance. Reiterating abiding affection for a spouse. Telling the offspring you're proud of them, and explaining why.

It is in this spirit, we surmise, that the new president of the United States took the occasion of his inaugural speech to summon us to "a new era of responsibility." After all, for a free society to function at its best, the universal practice of personal responsibility is self-evident.

This does not mean, though, that we can't stand reminding, and in that reminding, embrace a heightened sense of what acting responsibly entails. Achieving the same includes the embrace of qualities that include, but are not limited to, integrity, honesty, decency, civility, duty, thrift (and its first cousin, conservation), reliability, constancy, self-reliance and ethics.

As part of this new era, President Barack Obama's call urges "a recognition on the part of every American that we have duties to ourselves, our nation and the world." Well. That's a pretty tall rock wall for any of us to attempt to scale, let alone police, as This Space is, in part, journalistically deputized.

However large the challenge, This Space shall not shirk its obligation to President Obama's first executive recommendation. Instead, it hereby declares the opening of the Pasco Chapter of the Department of the New Era of Responsibility which will, from time to time, issue reports, updates and reflections on how we hereabouts are measuring up.

Now, it's all well and good to talk about the virtues and rewards of responsibility, but slipping on the pads to defend responsibility's turf is another level entirely. Consider the agenda for today's meeting of the Pasco County Legislative Delegation.

Citing dire constraints of the state budget, Gov. Charlie Crist has declared zero tolerance for homegrown spending. Nonetheless, representatives of 33 agencies or special interests have signed up to present public testimony. Without respect to the fine work most of them attempt to perform, any speaker supporting an exception on their behalf will be committing a clear violation of the responsibility prime directive.

Similarly, responsibility's new era packs ramifications for mischief-making among members of public boards, whether elected or appointed. What this means for - just to pick a name at random, the Port Richey City Council - is self-evident. How many times do we have to go down Unincorporation Boulevard before we figure out it's (say its residents) a road to nowhere? Obama has provided a new prism through which to observe future, energy-wasting forays.

Apply the ideals of responsibility to our behavior toward each other, no matter how fervently we disagree. Let's mind traffic signals, not merely those where red-light cameras are posted. Let's leave each other's campaign signs alone. (And let's collect them when the election is over.)

Obviously, parents with child-support obligations - we are thinking here of David William Earley, but not only of him - should always have done their utmost to keep up, but failure to do so now is downright unpatriotic.

So is fiddling with time sheets that suggest a police employee can be two places at once.

We have the full gamut of human organizational structures to save, from families to the planet, and we're being called out. It all starts here, wherever here is.

Now more than ever, personal responsibility is its own reward. Because now more than ever, the whole world is watching.

Tom Jackson can be reached at (813) 948-4219.

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