U.S. Government Not Working, So Chris Cox Of South Carolina Steps In, Perfectly

My new hero is a guy named Chris Cox of Mount Pleasant, South Carolina.

My new hero Chris  Cox tidied up the grounds
around the Lincoln Memorial because the
government shutdown made the landscape look shabby  

Cox. 45, is a chain saw sculptor who is in Washington DC for an art show.

The government shutdown means that the grounds around national treasures like the Lincoln Memorial are not being maintained, so they're starting to look shabby.

So Cox got to work, big time.  

He bought a $200 leaf blower at Home Depot, spent $100 on a used lawn mower at a thrift shop and got to work.

He mowed the lawn around the Lincoln Memorial, cleared pathways with his leaf blower, used his chain saw to get rid of a huge branch that fell across a walkway during a Monday storm, and cleaned out the trash barrels.

The U.S. Parks Service, which isn't doing any work except shooing people away from national monuments, shooed Cox away, too, but he got most of his work done (I don't blame the park rangers for doing this. They're kind of under orders to do so thanks to the idiots shutting down the government.)

I love this bit about Cox in the Washington Post:

"He said her does not have a political position on the shutdown. 'I'm not here to point fingers,' he said. 'I only want to inspire people to come out and make a difference.'"

"The building behind me serves as a moral compass, not only for our country but for the world. And over my dead body are we going to find trash pouring out of these trash cans,' he said. 'At the end of the day, we are the stewards of these huildings that are memorials."

Well, Chris Cox is totally the breath of fresh air we needed!

Frankly, though, it's my experience that most people really want to do the right thing. They might be imperfect, mistaken, wrong, stupid sometimes, but overall, they get things right and make things in their path better.

But when egos get in the way, it all goes south. Really, certain members of Congress seem like they would rather save face than save their country. Totally disgusting.

You want to fall into despair, but then people like Cox come along. He makes you think that maybe, yeah the idiots running the show are causing a huge clusterfuck, but maybe the rest of us can clean up the mess.

Cox used a mower, a leaf blower, and his generous frame of mind to clean up the mess. Not all of us have a mower or a leaf blower that will do any good easing this government shutdown.  I do feel a bit helpless as Congress careens out of control. But at least we had Cox to put just a tiny bit of order into the chaos.

Thank you Chris!!