I’ve been seeing a lot of blame running around the internet the last few days. Electoral College for being outdated. Democratic Party for not nominating Sanders. Republican Party for not stopping Trump. Third party candidates. FBI for last second email findings/non-findings. Liberal media. Conservative media. The list goes on and on and on yet fails to hit the target.
It’s not the politicians. It’s not the media. It’s not the back room wheelers and dealers. It’s the voters. Period. I find myself wondering just how many of the protesters over the last few days actually voted. I think it is a safe bet that a large number of them didn’t. After all, I’m sure somebody else will take care of it, right? And we can always start an on-line petition. Of all the absurdities of this election, the most absurd I saw was a petition about a month prior to the election to declare Trump unfit for office. Here’s an idea, if you don’t think the guy is fit for office, don’t vote for him! Speaking of non-voters, Hispanics here in southern Arizona were all bent out of shape after Jan Brewer said they didn’t matter because they don’t vote. Well guess what Southern Arizona Hispanics, Jan was right, you didn’t vote. So the lesson here for all those that want power in this nation is go ahead and call Mexicans thugs, rapists, and murderers, because there will be no consequence. And then there are those that did vote. The ones that ignored a long history of cons, bankruptcies, failures, and shady deals to elect a “proven businessman”. Religious voters that ignored multiple affairs while married and questionable parenting. The ones that glossed over the numerous active court cases simply because he was good at coming up with schoolyard names for his opponents. The voters that cut off their own noses to spite a single issue. The voters that claim Trump is not an insider and they are voting for change. In some ways, these hypocrites are the worst. The David Duke supporters voting for Trump I can understand. (Although even they hated Trump a few years ago calling him a wanna-be Jew.) All you “outsider gonna change the system” voters are the worst. In case you missed it, there were congressional elections happening also, and you know what? The majority of those congress critters got re-elected. That’s right. Once again, some of the supposedly most hated people on earth again won their particular popularity contest. Just like they always do. So much for outsiders changing the system. The average American Voter is lazy. They sit in an echo chamber listening only to that which fits their chosen narrative. No matter if that chamber is liberal or conservative. The average American Voter is greedy. People love to wax philosophical about what happens to a Democracy when the majority realizes they can vote to give themselves stuff. These are the same people that forget that W ran his first presidential election on how much money he was going to give people. They are hooked on tax breaks for the rich because someday they may be rich. This voter conveniently forgets the fact that trickle-down economics (once termed “Voodoo Economics” by Bush Sr.) hasn’t worked as advertised for thirty years. Single issues are all the American Voter can be bothered to think about when Dancing with the Stars and The Kardashians are so much more entertaining. American Voters have been mainlining fear for so long now that they will fall at the knees of anybody that even hints at protecting them. They will shun anybody that might possibly, maybe sort of one day sixty years in the future, give them a hangnail, even quicker. Nobody was forced to vote the way they did last Tuesday. It’s easy to think the system is rigged, broken, or outdated, but the reality is that a large enough group of people went to the poles and selected R that we now have a person that brags about assault, insults veterans, and seems to have no ability to ignore a petty feud with anyone as President Elect. Some were stimulus response voters selecting straight along party lines. Some actually thought about the choice they made. But they all voted freely. Everybody wants the system to change. Everybody thinks politicians are only out for themselves and will gladly stomp on the little guy. They are right. The system does need to change. Politicians will gladly kick the little guy out of the way. But here’s the thing. Why should politicians change? Why should they listen to the little guy? Why bother with the call of a population that keeps telling them to stop, yet gladly reelects them? The American voter has proven time and time again that they are more than willing and happy to reward politicians that step on them, piss on them, and kick them aside. The United States does not have a politician problem. The United States has a voter problem. Nothing will change until the voters of the United States realize that.
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All the hulabaloo over Kim Davis going to jail for not issuing marriage licenses has me thinking. Simply put, no matter where you stand on the moral side of the issue it is a fact that she did not do her job because of her personal ideals. Hero, martyr, or villain depends on your own personal beliefs.
One of the supposed ideals of the United States is the separation of church and state. To put it simply, the state has no business in which church you go to or who you worship. This separation has been slipping and looking back at our fairly recent history an interesting comparison can be made. When JFK was running for president many in the nation questioned what would happen to the nation with an openly practicing Catholic as president. The nation worried about religion in government. Under JFK’s guidance we went to the moon and saw great advances in science that we still enjoy today and the nation prospered. Flash forward to the election of George W Bush. One of the selling points of the campaign to elect Bush the second was his religion. The nation at this point was, and still is, obsessed with what church the candidates went to. His relationship with God was seen as a path to great leadership. (That, and the tax money he was going to give everybody.) With the election of Bush the younger rather than go to the moon we went to war. Rather than work together to get things done we became a nation that throws temper tantrums and shuts down everything just because we don’t like someone. Our pursuit of piety in leadership has seen the middle class get destroyed. We started giving passes to anybody that causes harm in the name of the correct form of worship. We have given up rationality and compassion to our fellow man in the pursuit of going to the proper church. That is what all this boils down to. Being able to rape, pillage, discriminate, and destroy in the name of religion. You can do whatever you want to do when God is on your side. For example, since 1976 one single issue has brought our government to a halt four out of eighteen times. Abortion alone has caused 22% of the government shutdowns. How much time and effort has been wasted tilting at issues that have no bearing on how the nation functions based solely on the writings of people that died over 2000 years ago? So what is the answer? It’s so simple that the nation should be ashamed that the question even needs to be asked. Kick the pontificators back to the church where they came from and belong. Stop asking candidates which church they go to because not only does it not matter, but church doesn’t automatically make one a good person. (Just ask an altar boy.) Stop cheering when someone says “God wants me to run for office.” Return to distrusting religion that seeks political power. Religion is not what makes America or any other nation great. I challenge you to find any first world nation that uses religion to guide policy. Give rational thought a try. And if the Kim Davis’ of the world don’t want to do the job they were hired to do, fine, that is their choice and they are entitled to object. But they are not entitled to use their government position to force their religion on the rest of us. That is, after all, what the Taliban/ISIS/Iran would do and we hate them. They worship God wrong. |
Step inside the mind of me.Hi. Welcome to my little electron of the internet, where you will find random comments about whatever pops into my mind! Previous mumblings
December 2021
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