Dr. Tom Coburn of Muskogee, former U.S. Congressman and Senator, seemed to us the exact kind of person the Founders envisioned when they wrote our national governmental documents.

They believed our nation would be best served by citizen-public servants who would not make government their careers.

They expected that others would follow the example of the first president, George Washington, who served two years in the presidency and then returned home.

Doctor Coburn was always a concerned citizen first and an official second.

He resigned from the Senate before completing his second elected term.

A believer in term limits, he pledged when he was elected he wouldn’t become a professional politician and he lived up to that promise.

We thought he quickly became sickened at what he saw in the national government – waste and corruption.

He did his best to change America’s course but he was a voice crying in the wilderness. There were too many entrenched self-seekers in the capitol intent on retaining their cushy positions at any cost while attempting to increasingly tighten the controls on those they were pledged to serve.

Kingfisher businessman Brian Walter had become close to Doctor Coburn in recent years, working with him in an effort to effect the changes in our government they believe were needed to preserve a constitutional republic, a sovereign nation of free people.

Doctor Coburn hated the national debt, which he considered both unnecessary and dangerous to our very existence.

Even before the nation was approaching its current $24 trillion debt, he was sending out warning signals.

Brian Walter’s list of Coburn quotes in his commentary on page 5 Wednesday illustrates this. We reprint them here as a reminder:

• “We need real leadership, Democrat, Republican, and Independent to stand up and say, we have to live within our means.”

• “The vast amount of waste and sheer stupidity in government – from the Pentagon to the FDA – could fill agendas for years.”

• “We should simply focus on first principles and give the American people what they want – honesty, common sense, fiscal responsibility and limited government. If we govern to save the country, we’ll do well.”

• “The problem that faces our country today, the last 30 years we have lived off the future, and the bill is coming due. There will not be one American that will not be called to sacrifice. Those that have more will be called to sacrifice more.”

Historically debt has been a major contributor to the fall of great nations. The founders recognized the potential for the downfall of the freest nation in history when they created it. James Madison warned: “If Congress can employ money indefinitely, for the general welfare, they may take the care of religion into their own hands; they may appoint teachers in every state, county, and parish, and pay them out of the public treasury. ... Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited government established by the people of America.”

Then columnist Cal Thomas recalls this warning from an 18th century Scottish lawyer and historian who said:

“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.

“The Founders would surely be shocked if they could see America today – and not favorably in spite of all the technological advances that have made life easier, thanks in no small part to the freedoms they installed in our system, which encouraged entrepreneurship and self reliance.

We have been warned.

So what are we going to do about it?

We owe it to our children, grandchildren and those that follow them to change course.

Both major parties are addicted to spending. We need to inquire of any representative from Oklahoma we send to Washington if they share those beliefs and then elect public servants like Dr. Tom Coburn.

Rest in Peace.