Today’s whole political agenda is frightening in so many ways. One can not read the newspaper (or any other news source) without being confronted with rabid, antagonistic, and largely racist diatribes against people of color, most notably the President of these “united” states and his followers. Truly I am not stupid enough to believe that these ranters and ravers are the majority of our country’s population but their vocal din intentionally muffles the voices of reason without which we do not survive.
Lately I have noticed something of interest. All of these diatribes are not only similar but they are redundant, dialectically and structurally identical, and display a blatant exemplar of faulty or non-existent analysis. Any competent user of the English language would immediately recognize the plagiaristic qualities of cut and paste technology. Cut and paste technology permits lazy thinkers to appropriate words from sources outside their intellectual comprehension, an exercise in faulty, illogical, or nonexistent analysis. My mother’s admonition comes to mind, “It is better to keep one’s mouth shut and let the world think you are a fool than to open your mouth (without thinking) and remove all doubt!”
We as Americans need to wake up and quit squabbling among ourselves. Our survival as a people is not a simple but rather a complex system which has many components. Those components affect each and every one of us. It we allow our inherent, childish, selfish emotions to hide our better nature, we are doomed. The founding fathers spoke of government of the people, by the people, for the people, a clearly stated unity of purpose.
Our early ancestors would reach out and help one another when needs were demonstrated. A forest fire struck the pine woods, the men grabbed needed tools and went to fight the fire. Some of the women fought the fire while others provided food and water. Flood waters came and neighbors came to help families move their possessions to safety. My stepmother wandered out at night and almost fell in the creek. The neighbors snatched her to safety and called me to come home since my father was in the hospital 30 miles away. No one expected monetary payment…payment would come around when a need arose. Those were the times when people understood that we helped each other because only in that way would all of us survive…no questions asked.
A physician we know went to Haiti (through the Dominican Republic) to look for a friend. Although the friend was not found, he did find people who needed help…and he helped because that was part of his upbringing..or as we say…part of his raising. A child needed help and a physician who chose to practice in the ghetto…reached out and did what needed to be done. A hill doctor jumped in his jalopy and drove down hollows , across creeks and bounced between ruts in a dirt road to see his patients. As a child I remember folk paying their doctor bills with a bushel of potatoes, a smoked ham from the family’s smokehouse, fresh canned vegetables, whatever they had to contribute. The community survived and life went on.
The best part of people’s nature is still here but if is being hidden by those who deliberately mislead and misinform others in an effort to disrupt a sane political and governmental response to the needs of ordinary, everyday folk. Corporate America would be willing to ignore the needs of children with handicaps ( a friend who has a child with spina bifida, another friend with an epileptic child…you know those people with pre-existing conditions). It is time to remember what this country is supposed to be about and quit clouding the issues with smokescreens!
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Revisiting the Generation of My Elders
The spirits of the family elders are laughing all over Heaven this morning. They have been peeping through the clouds for months now checking on the family and the political climate in this country. (Don't bother telling me what the dearly departed can't do...they did a pretty good job of keeping up with the deeds and misdeeds of my generation when they were on this side of paradise...I doubt their changing sides has stopped any of them! I'm willing to bet my brother is still telling and retelling the Obama election story and has been ever since he crossed over.)
For a generation born on the cusp of the end of slavery, my grandparents saw some remarkable changes in the country, the world and in our little corner of the universe. They went through two World Wars, the Korean Conflict, the Great Depression. That wooden boxed Crosley radio on the table by the front door brought them the news of the world until it was replaced by that small screened black and white television which brought them even more news...some of which was greeted by raised eyebrows I'm sure. The dawn of the Space Age amazed my grandfather (then in his 90's) but he watched several blastoffs! He wouldn't have missed them. He and my grandmother listened and scratched their heads in wonderment at many of the world's changes. Quietly, late at night when I was supposed to be asleep, I'd listen to their comments shared in the companionship of a 70 year marriage.
Politically, they were Republicans....members of the Party of Lincoln...a membership my grandfather maintained proudly until that party betrayed him by nominating Barry Goldwater as their candidate for President. Although deeply disappointed and angry that a man he considered a racist of the worst order would be the nominee...Grandpa made his decision. Since all of his grandchildren had been well schooled in his political views (by him), the Old One decided that it was Final Exam Day and we were all summoned home to West Virginia.
Of course, none of us would have supported Goldwater. We knew that our only viable strategy was to vote for Johnson and we would. For me...facing my first Presidential election, I knew that I would never register as a Republican so I bit the bullet and registered as an Independent (I didn't plan to take the chewing out I expected from Grandpa over my party selection). Yes, I know that there was supposed to be no way he could have found out but...I knew better. Nothing happened in our small town that the elder grapevine didn't communicate faster than a telephone call and in the 60's...most of them didn't have their own phones!
The story has been told before...each of us was questioned as to how he or she would vote. As the youngest voter...I told my grandfather that none of us would vote Republican and to my shock...he was relieved. Then I got brave and asked him what he was going to do because he had never missed a vote in his life and he NEVER crossed party lines. I wasn't prepared for his answer....he wasn't going to vote! In shock I asked him why...and he told me....He was going to die! At 96 years and some months, my grandfather did exactly that.
I changed my party registration and although I may have crossed party lines in local elections...the Republican party has held no interest for me...ever. If it had held any interest...watching them unanimously vote against the Health Care Reform Act in the House of Representatives would have been the final irrevocable nail in coffin. To me the only obvious reason for such obstructionist behavior is blatant RACISM, a refusal to work with a black President of the United States!
This morning...here comes John McCain....another Republican from Arizona...who wants to repeal the Health Care Reform Act! What is it about the Arizona air that creates people with such extremely antagonistic agendas? As a child and a participant of the Civil Rights Age, I don't need an interpreter to recognize the behaviors of extreme and selfish prejudicial behavior. Goldwater, McCain, Klan, Teabaggers, whatever agenda is presented...it may not be identical but, its all the same. This morning, I blocked a former childhood friend on my Facebook page because of the same issue. I have seen rat holes in apartments rented to poor people in Washington, D.C.; a grub worm burrowing into an open sore in a toddler's leg (in that same neighborhood...where I personally paid a doctor friend to ILLEGALLY excise the grub from the child's leg); watched a friend die of a treatable cancer (because she had no health insurance and couldn't pay for a doctor)....and I could go on and maybe on another day I will.
The elders would say that the chickens are finally coming home to roost. They may be right...we'll see.
For a generation born on the cusp of the end of slavery, my grandparents saw some remarkable changes in the country, the world and in our little corner of the universe. They went through two World Wars, the Korean Conflict, the Great Depression. That wooden boxed Crosley radio on the table by the front door brought them the news of the world until it was replaced by that small screened black and white television which brought them even more news...some of which was greeted by raised eyebrows I'm sure. The dawn of the Space Age amazed my grandfather (then in his 90's) but he watched several blastoffs! He wouldn't have missed them. He and my grandmother listened and scratched their heads in wonderment at many of the world's changes. Quietly, late at night when I was supposed to be asleep, I'd listen to their comments shared in the companionship of a 70 year marriage.
Politically, they were Republicans....members of the Party of Lincoln...a membership my grandfather maintained proudly until that party betrayed him by nominating Barry Goldwater as their candidate for President. Although deeply disappointed and angry that a man he considered a racist of the worst order would be the nominee...Grandpa made his decision. Since all of his grandchildren had been well schooled in his political views (by him), the Old One decided that it was Final Exam Day and we were all summoned home to West Virginia.
Of course, none of us would have supported Goldwater. We knew that our only viable strategy was to vote for Johnson and we would. For me...facing my first Presidential election, I knew that I would never register as a Republican so I bit the bullet and registered as an Independent (I didn't plan to take the chewing out I expected from Grandpa over my party selection). Yes, I know that there was supposed to be no way he could have found out but...I knew better. Nothing happened in our small town that the elder grapevine didn't communicate faster than a telephone call and in the 60's...most of them didn't have their own phones!
The story has been told before...each of us was questioned as to how he or she would vote. As the youngest voter...I told my grandfather that none of us would vote Republican and to my shock...he was relieved. Then I got brave and asked him what he was going to do because he had never missed a vote in his life and he NEVER crossed party lines. I wasn't prepared for his answer....he wasn't going to vote! In shock I asked him why...and he told me....He was going to die! At 96 years and some months, my grandfather did exactly that.
I changed my party registration and although I may have crossed party lines in local elections...the Republican party has held no interest for me...ever. If it had held any interest...watching them unanimously vote against the Health Care Reform Act in the House of Representatives would have been the final irrevocable nail in coffin. To me the only obvious reason for such obstructionist behavior is blatant RACISM, a refusal to work with a black President of the United States!
This morning...here comes John McCain....another Republican from Arizona...who wants to repeal the Health Care Reform Act! What is it about the Arizona air that creates people with such extremely antagonistic agendas? As a child and a participant of the Civil Rights Age, I don't need an interpreter to recognize the behaviors of extreme and selfish prejudicial behavior. Goldwater, McCain, Klan, Teabaggers, whatever agenda is presented...it may not be identical but, its all the same. This morning, I blocked a former childhood friend on my Facebook page because of the same issue. I have seen rat holes in apartments rented to poor people in Washington, D.C.; a grub worm burrowing into an open sore in a toddler's leg (in that same neighborhood...where I personally paid a doctor friend to ILLEGALLY excise the grub from the child's leg); watched a friend die of a treatable cancer (because she had no health insurance and couldn't pay for a doctor)....and I could go on and maybe on another day I will.
The elders would say that the chickens are finally coming home to roost. They may be right...we'll see.
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