My money is hard to come by these days and it seems to buy less and less, so it is important to me to get my money’s worth when I buy something. When the shoe is on the other foot, I like to think the same principle applies. I want to give people their money’s worth.

By the way, did you know that the saying “the shoe is on the other foot” comes from the 1800’s when the saying was “the boot is on the other leg.” Before then, boots or shoes were made to fit either foot. You probably knew that already.

Jeff Miller is a Republican congressman from Florida and is the Chairman of the House Committee on Veteran’s Affairs. We all know how much the subject of healthcare for our veterans has been in the news. The news, lately, has been very disturbing and disturbing only because of some courageous people who came forward to describe some scandalous behavior.

It has led to the perfunctory finger-pointing and blame-game and Congressional Hearings. I think Congressional “Hearing” is a good definition of what they do. I would be more interesting is some Congressional “Doing!”

Miller, recently, said this: “the president needs to outline a long-term vision for what is clearly a broken VA (Veteran Affairs Department).” I don’t mean to quibble with the congressman’s words, but I might add, “What has your committee been doing?”

Here is another story. Along our southern border, from Texas to California, hundreds weekly and over 40,000 since October, children and youth have been pouring into our country seeking refuge from their awful conditions in Central America.

These children and youth have walked, been transported by trucks, buses, or trains, through the country of Mexico and have simply been dumped on our doorstep. Border agents don’t know what to do. Governors of those Border States are damned if they take them in and damned if they don’t.

I heard Governor Rick Perry of Texas say on a radio program that he had written the President about this very problem in 2012. He has heard nothing, nor has Congress put forth any kind of plan to deal with this humanitarian problem, except, of course, to spend billions. Imagine if you lived in a state that had to deal with that situation and had to come up with a solution. Memo to Washington: Don’t just sit there, do something!

One more situation. A few weeks ago, I mentioned a debt clock that is in runaway mode. It was a relatively short time ago, that the debt seemed manageable; not good, but manageable. In the last ten years, we have added $10 trillion! Yet, the outcry is negligible.

This trifecta of situations has occurred under both parties so my challenge is not of a partisan nature. I vote a certain way, but it doesn’t seem to matter who is in charge. The point might be that it seems that no one is doing anything.

Tremendous amounts of money are spent in being elected to various offices. I began this column by saying that I like to get my money’s worth, but by all the inaction on all the serious problems that we have, it doesn’t seem that, that is the case.