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| Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton |
VERSUS
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| The Baracuda and the Dancer |
This Tuesday is the day to cast your vote. It shouldn't be a big deal, but apparently there are a lot of people who are not planning to vote because they think it doesn't matter or are sniveling about President Obama not having made enough progress. All I can say is that if you think he hasn't made enough progress so far, just go ahead and don't vote or vote against the Democrats and see what that gets you, i.e. if you think it's bad now, you ain't seen nothin' yet.
All this claptrap about FREEDOM and SOCIALISM and GOVERNMENT TAKEOVER and I AM YOU is just a smokescreen for the hypocritical takeover by those who really do want to take over your life and tell you that there is no separation between church and state or that your children should not know that gay people exist or that you can't read what you want to or that you don't already pay for the health care of poor people through higher insurance rates, etc., etc., etc.
More than all those things, though, is the ignorance and disrespect for facts, intelligence and truth that so many politicians are showing. It just makes my hair curl to the point that I can't even watch the news on television because my blood starts boiling.
“The press is our immune system. If it overreacts to everything, we actually get sicker. And perhaps eczema. And yet, with that being said, I feel good. Strangely, calmly good. Because the image of Americans that is reflected back to us by our political and media process is false… why would we work together? Why would you reach across the aisle, to a pumpkin-assed forehead eyeball monster?" (from Jon Stewart's speech at the rally via the internet)
The Real Message from the rally: "If we amplify everything, we hear nothing."
It's always been a thrill for me to vote. I really love walking into those school basements or town halls and seeing the voting place and giving my name and address to those people behind the tables. Many times there are not that many good choices, and sometimes I only cast one vote because I have not educated myself about people running for school committee or state congressman, but I always show up to vote. I do it for myself and for my foremothers who worked so hard and so long to get the right to vote. How can I not show up to honor their struggle?
"The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex." (19th amendment to the Constitution ratified in 1920) When my mother was born in 1917, women did not have the right to vote. That's a little too close for comfort.
It's a weird world we live in when huge crowds of people come together to rally in support of sanity and/or fear. If you are sane, you are fearful is the message, I guess. I am afraid that the nut cases are taking over and that people are just sitting back and letting them do it without challenging them.
Are we too polite about it? Do we let them make false claims without challenging them?
“Not being able to be able to distinguish between real racists and Tea Partiers, or real bigots and Juan Williams or Rick Sanchez is an insult, not only to those people but to the racists themselves, who have put in the exhausting effort it takes to hate. Just as the inability to distinguish terrorists from Muslims makes us less safe, not more.” (from Jon Stewart's speech at the rally via the internet)
I think the Democrats need to speak up for themselves more and state what they believe in. Why don't they say what they mean? Why don't they challenge the lies and hypocrisy? Instead they mealy-mouth their way through things and come off looking like fools. But they're my fools - and I hope they are yours.
Posters in this post from the Jon Stuart/Stephen Colbert rally came from Facebook via Political Loudmouth.com
Read More About It
If you want to read more about the difference between Democrats and Republicans, Mira Schor posted a very well-written piece on Facebook and the Huffington Post about being a Yellow Dog Democrat (it means that she'd vote for a yellow dog before she'd vote for a Republican). I agree with her and seeing as two yellow dogs (yellow Labs) are part of our family, I would call myself a triple Yellow Dog Democrat.
7 comments:
I voted early and Republican. Wake up and smell the coffee!
Dear WBA...seems like we've canceled one another but doing it was a thrill.
Oh, I wish I could have attended that rally. My heart was with those I know that did. Intelligent friends who took their children to experience the positive vibe of this rally. A gay couple that wants equality with heterosexual couples (and they are damn fine people), my two 19-year-old nieces who want to live in a country built on love and acceptance along with a strong economy.
I will be working at the polls tomorrow, wishing that everyone who voted was doing it for the overall good of their country and everybody in it, not just their individual wallets and fear of "subversive" sex acts and public schools.
I'll be voting to tax myself if someone needs assistance, an education, roads, or other public services.
Great post!!!
Thank you. And I hope LOTS of women read this and open their eyes and remember: We haven't had the right to vote for very long! Get out there and vote!!! Oh yeah, but I bet lots of your readers are the voting kind.
I hope that people will make the pollsters heads spin tomorrow by actually going to the polls and voting against all expectations. We have a very short collective memory in the U.S., but I hope it gets jogged and people recall where this economic mess, two never-ending wars and all the hate-mongering talk came from.
Oh, Wax Beach Artist, what a disappointment to learn that you voted republican. We have so little as artists. Under repub rule, what little we do have will be whittled away, showing up mostly as higher costs for basic goods and services while the wealthiest 1% will get more tax breaks. Think they're going to use their extra wealth to buy our art? Think again. The wealthiest one percenters will buy art as an investment, the seven-figure stuff that has nothing to do with us.
When was the last time a repub authorized funds for art or artists? Wax Beach, I hope you're above child-bearing age, because your right to abortion is about to expire. Got any gay relatives? They're about to find life a whole lot harder.
The smell wafting over this way has nothing to do with coffee.
Thanks for this post, Nancy. I love that photo of Anthony and Stanton!
Let's remember, too, that many civil rights fighers, black and white, male and female, worked hard to register black voters in lthe hostile South in the 60s. James Chaney, andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, working on voter registration, were killed in the dead of night by klansmen.
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