A personal experience with the 'deep state'

The ongoing "impeachment inquiry" in the U.S. Congress prompted me to recall an informal conversation I had in D.C. with a senior and long-serving, but un-elected government official more than a decade ago. At the time, I was venting my displeasure with the workings of the federal government and asserted that with its three branches, it was comparable to a three-ring circus with each ring filled with silly clowns.

After saying my piece, the senior official suggested that I calm down and not worry because, while the clowns in the governmental circus come and go, " ... we are always there. We work daily to tone down, slow walk, or correct the stupidity of the clowns and to make sure that government stays on the right track." The official didn't then use the term, but was, of course, describing the "Deep State" about which we've recently learned so much.

In retrospect, the deep state of a decade ago was much less intrusive than it now is. After observing the behavior of our elective officials, executives with political appointments and the career staff that backs them up - first in the Judge Kavanaugh and Mueller Report hearings and now in the Adam Schiff Medicine Show - we have seen that the Deep Staters wrongly, but truly believe they are there to formulate public policy; and not to simply implement public policy decisions of a duly-elected president and, where apt, affirmed by Congress.

The scheming, the lying, the disloyalty, the leaking, the lack of civility and the viciousness of today's Deep Staters gives me no comfort. Instead it is hard to believe and hard to stomach. Today, D.C. seems more like a mental health institution than a circus full of clowns and dangerously, its inmates are running the asylum. This dysfunction puts our country at risk and must be remedied.

Charles F. Falk

Schaumburg