Trying...trying...argh...never mind!

I have been trying really, really hard to keep politics off of this blog.

I know that politics is a fact of life - whether someone gets a congressional paycheck or just needs to play nice with the local barista to get that cup of coffee you like "just right" - there are always politics involved.

I have been loathe to bring politics into this sunny little blog (ok, it's not always sunny, lol), because I am respectful of others' beliefs and their right to believe things that I do not understand or support myself. I am pretty adamant about the right to think on our own. To go to the church we want to, to support the candidate of our choice, and to paint a house the most unsettling colors (to me anyway).

But, for the first time in my life, I am actually afraid of what the future might hold. And, even though it may be somewhat unpopular, I think that our government of the last eight years has had a lot to do with where we all are. So, for those of you that don't agree, or don't want to hear it, or just can't take one more rant on the political state of our world, then please click here, to go to a happy place and come back another day to catch up on me and goofy.

OK...so now that you've been warned...



This one comment has been made much of in the last few days. Some want to make it more than it is. Some want to make it less. What I want to make of it is this: who cares if an old man loses his train of thought and can't remember the name of the guy he's talking about? Our grandparents do it all the time. But what I do care about is that everyone is trying to make it more than that. "it's demeaning", "it's racist"...for crying out loud. It's a guy that is of a generation where "that one" is what they said when they couldn't remember the name of who they were talking about. McCain's people don't want to point that out either, though, as it makes him look old. Better to be racist than old...wow.

I am SO SICK of all the childish name calling and muck raking going on at this point in political campaigns. It's not any one campaign in particular - it's become the norm, sadly. I am just so tired of being presumed to be an ignorant, uneducated, easily distracted moron.

It's insulting.

Please DO NOT tell me what "she" did in high school with the quarterback under the bleachers, or what "he" did when he was a freshman in college. Don't dig up old co-workers or "exes" or fellow committee members or someone "bad" that was at the same party.

TELL ME WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO DO TO GET US OUT OF THIS MESS!!!

I generally think that when candidates start telling me what is wrong with their opponent, rather then telling me what they are going to do better for us, it's because they don't have any ideas or plans of their own. They are incompetent to the point where they have nothing to say about what they plan to do to help us out of this mess we are now mired so deeply in.

I have to say that I am not entirely sold on my choice for president. I have my reservations and concerns. I won't go into that here, 'cause we all have our own opinions. For me, this year, it's more a matter of who I think will do the least damage than who I think will help the most. I just know that I can't have more of the same thing that has gotten us where we are now.

And I don't ENTIRELY blame them or congress, or really, even, the current administration. These folks are just doing what comes naturally in a power situation where no one is watching or imposing any restraints or safe guards.

I blame US. All of us that have so willingly been lead down the happy little path of apathy and incompetence.

For the first time - ever - I am convinced that we will not have lives as good as those our parents experienced. We didn't work any less hard - we just stopped paying attention and making decisions for ourselves.

We chose to believe the garbage we've been fed - swallowing it whole regardless of all of the evidence to the contrary. We've even gone so far as to call those that have tried - screaming and kicking - to wake us up to our ignorance "traitors" and "un-american".

What the hell is that? UN-AMERICAN? Isn't the most dearly held tenet of our country that we all have the right to speak freely and question our own government? Isn't that the one basic "freedom" that we've all proudly pointed to? But in this new world order, we don't listen, we just gaze with glazed eyes and ipod headphones securely in our ears spouting ever more soothing platitudes to dull our brains and quiet our questions. If we speak out now, we are labeled and watched by the government - who now has but to wave the flag of homeland security to erase all of our rights as citizens of the United States of America - rights we thought were "inalienable". I grieve for the people that so easily throw away this most basic cornerstones of who we are.

"I'm not a criminal, I don't have anything to hide, so I don't care if the government taps my phone, or looks at my bank accounts or checks up on me" without cause or a warrant. OMG! OMG! I actually heard this from a twenty-something I know and think of as intelligent.

I weep...really....tears of fear and frustration and loss at what will become of all of us as our children take this attitude into the future. We have failed them and ourselves.

Is this the country that we want? I pray to God that it isn't.

But is it what we deserve? Yeah, I think it is.

We dropped the ball, we let others tell us what we think, even when our eyes contradicted. We've become intolerant in our "tolerance", unequal in our "equality", terrified by our own government to the point where we gave up without a fight or a whimper basic "rights" that our founding fathers fought and died for, mindless and apathetic

Now, we need to fix it. Not the government, not the politicians. WE NEED TO DO IT. It's probably too late for it to be ok for us anymore...but for our kids, maybe.

Get out and vote. Take the time to figure out what you think for yourself. Listen to what is being said and make your own determinations of what that means for you. THINK. Be responsible.

VOTE

Don't be a lemming being lead off to slaughter...

Show the world that we are not the idiots we appear to be. WE have a lot to fix and a lot to make up for. We aren't who we think we are...we are not the best, the most powerful, the brightest, the "rightest". But we can be...we need to be.

I just can't stand it...

M&G