Americans For Prosperity is doing a "Spending Revolt" tour around the United States and they are in Wisconsin this week so I stopped by their event at Copeland Park in La Crosse to hear what they had to say.  I'm on their mailing list and I have attended their events in the past.  I missed their big Tea Party in Madison due to my work schedule but I heard it was an excellent event and I really appreciate the message that they are spreading across the country.

Several candidates for public office spoke about the need for our various governments to stop spending and start applying common sense to the way they are conducting business on behalf of the people.

Mayor Harter welcomed the group to La Crosse and Dan Kapanke talked about the need to reign in the United States Congress.  His short talk about politicians getting back to being servants of the people was well received by the audience and Krista Branch entertained us with her beautiful song as well.

Pastor David King also spoke at the event and I was blown away by his down-to-earth, values driven ideas.  He spoke about how the voters of America must take their duty as citizens seriously by going out and learning about the candidates.  He mentioned that we must end the habits of the past where we elect people simply based on 30-second soundbytes or how "nice" a candidate looks.  Well put sir!

"Joe the Plumber" also spoke about finding good and decent people to serve as our representatives and how we must stop making decisions based on whether there is a "D" or "R" next to someone's name.  He makes an excellent point and it reminds me of some of George Washington's writings when he expressed his concerns about the formation of political parties.  I spoke with Joe a little bit before the event and I think he nailed it when he talked about how some of the leaders in both parties are letting us down but I think it has more to do with the lack of participation by regular folks more than anything else.  Political Parties are simply groups of people and when they are led by selfish and/or greedy individuals instead of Patriots then trouble will certainly follow.

I also ran into Dave Westlake and had a nice conversation with him.  I'll be following up with him sometime to have a more in depth discussion so stay tuned.

Did I receive a special, insider pass in order to go to this event and speak with these individuals one-on-one?  No, it was open to the public and anyone could just stop by.  I recently told somoene that just showing up is 90% of the process of participating in our great system of representative government.  I encourage you to just show up at future events and get to know these candidates for yourself.

The theme of the event was about stopping the out-of-control spending in both Madison and Washington but the underlying message was that, as citizens of the United States, it is our duty to participate in the process to ensure good people are elected to represent us.  I firmly believe that more regular folks participating in our political process will go a long way to cleaning up the mess we have today.  November is just around the corner.  Come on out and be a part of the process so you won't regret the outcome.