One of the most gratifying parts of writing this column and having a radio show is the opportunity to speak with people about things that are important in their lives and communities. Over the last few months I’ve spoken to or with people from all over Western Colorado.

My conclusion is that while people are energized to take charge of their personal and political lives, there is still a strong strain of uncertainty about how to accomplish that goal.

Now that citizens are starting to take the time to compare where they thought their communities and governments should be with where they actually are, the difference is alarming.

When people ask me what we should do to get control back in our individual and political lives, I tell them we should probably look at the path that got us here and see if we can retrace our steps.

Most of today’s troubling issues didn’t start a year ago, or eight years ago, but by a slow process over the last 40 years, with some logarithmic acceleration thrown in over the last five or six.  I can’t refer to the process as evolution since that implies some sense of improvement. We should probably identify it as devolution from the elegant system that was put into place by our founders.

Here is a root problem: Whenever citizens spend time discussing national and federal issues they should first look to their cities, counties and states, since they are the elemental building blocks of a constitutional republic, not the representatives we send to Washington. A federal government, under our system, is the product of local government, not its originator.

Our founding documents were meant to protect the relationship of the citizens to a government they institute among themselves from faraway rulers and their demands.  Americans were never intended to be supplicants at the throne of elected oligarchs.

Somehow, that has gotten so turned on its head that even municipalities turn hopeful eyes to Washington for help, support and redistribution of income.

One reason people are so interested in national politics is because they have become so important to local politics, we have become less a bottom-up constitutional republic and more of a top-down bureaucracy.

Ideally, we should keep most of our money for our local communities and provide a minimum amount to the federal government for limited but important purposes.

Instead, we now send most of our money away, to be assessed a processing fee, repackaged and — if the proper political winds are blowing — returned for approved purposes. The recent federal stimulus bills are just the latest examples of loss of local control and the creation of municipal welfare.

What else can you call a situation such as when the city of Grand Junction, having lost the argument for new public service facilities with local taxpayers, applies for “stimulus” money to build part of the voter-rejected facility? If taxpayers in the city that is going to be served by such projects don’t believe it is a wise use of money, why should we believe it is a viable alternative to have taxpayers in Oklahoma or Maryland fund the project?

Our local governments approach grants as though the money were created out of thin air and not extracted from taxpayers, not only in our own area but largely in others.  Is this anything less than redistribution of income? Is it not an example of from each according to his ability to each according to his need? We are quick to label this socialism when done for the benefit of individuals, but how different is it when it is done for the benefit of local governments?

If people are in need of community solutions, they should first look to community self-reliance and not hope that a national government will pick the pockets of other citizens for their benefit. The first step toward recovering local control is reducing taxes sent to faraway places and lessening our use of the taxes of others. Responsible government starts right here, not across the Potomac.

Rick Wagner offers more thoughts on politics at his blog, The War on Wrong, which can be reached through the blogs entry at GJSentinel.com.