Looking past the U.S. Capitol and the Washington Monument to the Northern Virginia suburbs. (AP Photo)

Too often, the reason that people try to get elected to office is to work up to the point of getting to Washington D.C., and then cash in.

It's not just former Congressman or Senators that become lobbyists; it's their staff, federal judges and state attorney's general. The list of revolving door participants is very long, and it is a group very focused on making deals to fatten their wallets.

So, of course Americans feel disenfranchised when they see what is happening in D.C., and barring voting every election, their common phrase is, "What can I do?"

A good case has been made for several avenues, like informing your fellow citizen of what is happening, meeting with like-minded people on a regular basis to help inform one another, while working to influence your representatives in State affairs and in Washington D.C. There are other information-based ways as well, but when you take a look at what really runs D.C., all the air goes out of your sails. You end up feeling defeated with the nasty suspicion that that is precisely how D.C. wants you to feel.

Any rising up by individual Americans is effectively shut down when the main communications, policy directives, and laws come from D.C., and your only means of effective communication into D.C. comes as a result of the amount of money you can bring to the table. The average American doesn't have the resources to make himself heard, and he can be rejected by Congress and K Street as a lone crank, complaining of a situation that he can't possibly understand or stop.

But we do understand it, and it's another painful truth that regular Americans are more intelligent and vastly more ethical than the suits swimming in the D.C. cesspool. The fact that we are paying them all to swamp it up makes us all the more enraged.

So many can see this all so clearly, and in a sober moment, they reach the conclusion that there is absolutely nothing they can do to begin to turn the tide on the outrage of our nation's capital. So they quit being optimistic, begin to recede from useful activities that might change minds and rally others to the cause, and that is a dirty rotten shame.

The problems that come at us from Washington D.C. tend to bog us down, but when we look at our closest examples of goodness in the human race, like the handshake of a fellow worshiper, the door held open at the gas station, a cut ahead in line at the grocery store because you have just a few items, we realize that it is these sorts of civil interactions that make things not seem so bad, and we need to preserve them.

Rather than focus on what is wrong in Washington, would it be better to focus on what is right at home?

Congress is set to pass a trillion reasons why you should support an Article V Convention of States. It is a movement that puts the amendment process to the Constitution in the hands of state legislators, and therefore, closer to home. Yes, we can all see that Washington D.C. is out of control, and with so much funny money changing hands, the greed and avarice in that town will triumph over our attempts to elect politicians with the guts to stop it.

But in your own states, you can better organize. In your own state, your Senate and House representatives are closer to home, and you have a bigger platform for addressing them. Right now, organizers of the Convention of States project are looking for people to commit to reigning in our federal government. Get involved, and let's truly use the last tool for addressing a runaway D.C., and take our country back.

Jen Kuznicki is a wife and mother, seamstress by trade, and American patriot who says, "Now is the time to act."