Vinnie Baiocchetti: Government elected leaders are meant to represent us

To The Daily Sun,

Neither the United States nor the New Hampshire constitutions ever use the word "leader." Instead, they repeatedly emphasize forms of the word "represent." Our elected local, county, state and federal officials are meant to be our representatives, not our rulers.

Unfortunately, elected officials, regardless of party, have lost sight of this core principle. Political parties now prioritize party loyalty and goals over the well-being of constituents, shifting influence away from everyday citizens and toward corporations and special interest groups. This growing partisan divide is driven not by the voters, but by those seeking to protect their own power. To restore accountability, we must remind elected officials who put them in office and who holds the power to remove them.

Doing so requires us to actually become involved and look beyond the biased media, social media, celebrity endorsements, political brow beating, smearing and uninformed commentary.

We cannot simply blame elected officials; we share in the responsibility. As a society, we have become disengaged and often fail to participate or vote. It is our civic duty to educate ourselves by tracking each representative’s voting records, reviewing policy and proposed legislation directly and most importantly, engaging respectfully and consistently in the entire process. When left unchecked, our elected representatives become by default, our elected leaders.

When we vote, our decisions must not be dictated by party loyalty, it must be rooted in the foundational promise that begins with the first three words of our governing document, the Constitution: We the People.

Vinnie Baiocchetti

Gilmanton Iron Works