As a volunteer working with the Obama campaign, one of the things that I hear all too often from Republicans is a line that goes something like "I/ we do not believe we need to give away our money to people who are here illegally, or who are drug addicts or who just don't care to work and look to the govt. for their living"...
I understand, as my fellow Democrats do, that you want to be able to hold on to your hard-earned money. We all do. But what is it, exactly, that you think Senator Obama is going to do that is worse than what is already happening? Your statement is a line straight out of some Republican fear-mongering talking point...it's a line, almost verbatim, taken from various conservative mouthpieces for years. (O'Reilley, perhaps, or Limbaugh? Hannity? Scarborough? McCain? Palin?)
The thing is, like it or not, as citizens of our country, it is one of our founding principles (not to mention the principles of a certain "radical" from 2000 years ago) to care for those least able to care for themselves.
The other day, I was on a call with a guy who said he didn't want to have to subsidize or support "Jerome or Shanika in Chicago who don't want to work." Aside from being offensively and obviously racist code for "welfare mothers" or "lazy ethnic minorities", my question to him was if he was happier giving away his money to bail out corporations who have made it impossible for Jerome or Shanika to find jobs here in the first place? Or whether or not he knew that Jerome or Shanika were receiving help from the government because they were a part of the HUGE population of "working poor" who work 40 hours or more per week and still don't make enough to support their families? (Two of my own children would both fall into that category if they weren't living at home)
As for the handouts to drug dealers and junkies? Believe me, drug addicts and drug dealers aren't the only ones in the welfare lines looking to the government for help. Generally speaking, neither the junkie or the dealer wants to call attention to themselves (...besides, junkies often don't have it together enough to consistently go through the application process, and the dealers sometimes have more money than anyone in the neighborhood and will skip the bureaucratic headache.)
So if it's not the junkies or dealers or lazy welfare queens who are living on the dole, who is it that is asking for help?
· There are the handicapped/disabled who need help with physical and health care, who want to work or who do work, but who's wages don't match their living expenses. (My daughter's boyfriend, who has an amputated leg, for god's sake, with half of his other foot missing, was turned down for disability insurance because he couldn't sufficiently PROVE he was handicapped?!!)
· There are the families like the ones I've met lately who have had their homes foreclosed on thanks to Dubya's "ownership society" programs that paid dividends to mortgage companies and banks for each new mortgage they provided eager-to-be homeowners, whether it was a smart mortgage or not.
· They are the families like the ones I've met who have lost job after job after job because there is just nothing here anymore! People who, unlike the Republican caricature of them, want to work and do work just to have the floor pulled out from underneath them when their job disappears.
· People like the current and former soldiers who have had almost NO support from the Republican administration; those who claim so loudly to thank our men and women in uniform, to appreciate them and love them, and then send them into two god-forsaken hellholes without enough support or equipment, with broken promises about how long their deployments will be, with news blackouts about how many deaths are occurring, and NO support when they return home. That "war hero" John McCain has voted against veteran's interests at nearly every turn! And then he uses his status as a veteran (Oh, and did you know he was a P.O.W.?) to pander to those he's betrayed the most.
· They are the families who face the debilitating challenge of chronic illness or mental illness or drug addiction, who need specialized help that is crucial to a family member, but who cannot afford the expense of private treatment. (And who don't have the ability to take a second $60,000 mortgage to pay for one year of private care like we did.)
But what if Jerome or Shanika aren't working because they have a drug addiction or a mental illness or physical limitations on what they are capable of doing? Whose job is it to help them? Isn't this WHY we have a government in the first place?
I have heard repeatedly a favorite Republican line about taking "personal responsibility" for oneself as justification for cutting benefits for those in need. And, perhaps you will be surprised to learn, we Liberals agree with you. Individual accountability is, ideally, the goal for all of us. But if that isn't possible, and if the government doesn't take responsibility, then what? Push them all off a cliff? Dump them all into some "untouchables" ghetto and forget about them? Rely on the good Christian churches and charities to bail them out? Leaving aside the bureaucratic bullshit people have to go through to receive "charity" from many of those organizations, and the humiliation people feel in having to ask strangers for help, or the evangelical indoctrination they endure to receive it, there are only a fraction of these churches or organizations available to help.
When a dear friend of mine (Caucasian, by the way) decided eight years ago to keep her pregnancy and not abort, (the father having bailed out upon hearing the news of her pregnancy) she depended on the government to help her; she got food stamps when she needed them, welfare to help her pay her rent for two years, all while driving her 10 year old car to two different jobs. She now has a stable relationship with her new partner, and they have a new baby. They are trying to buy the house they've been renting, she is working as a cleaning lady and he works at some manufacturing job after losing two similar jobs to the businesses closing. She is also attending night school at the University, one or two classes each semester to get her degree in Computer Science. Is she included in that "Jerome and Shanika" stereotype?
While another standard conservative retort, "Your candidate is by official record the most liberal voter in the senate" may or may not be true, according to who you read, it is another favorite factoid of the Republican noise machine. The question I have about that statement is, what exactly does that mean? When exactly did the term "liberal" become a four-letter-word? When did it become OK to mock and denigrate people who are generous, who care about people other than themselves, who accept people unlike themselves, who are intelligent for god's sake, who are hopeful, who are optimistic, who are artistic, who want to take care of the planet, who believe that conversation and understanding are far more effective in achieving peace than guns and bombs, who believe that people are more important that corporations, who believe that:
· "What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul."
· "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
· It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven (Luke 18:25)"
· Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God
· You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
· Unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more.
· It is more blessed to give than to receive.
· Give, and it shall be given to you. For whatever measure you deal out to others, it will be dealt to you in return."
· 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'
I think the mistake many Republicans have made is that they have been deluded into believing that by following first Reagan, then Dubya, and now McCain, that they will be included in some sort of superior group, some imaginary "winning team", part of that elusive top one percent. The irony of this belief is that the whole existence of that elite 1% depends on them preventing you from "growing" or becoming part of their "team", even while encouraging you to work to that end. The Republicans have been quite proud of describing the Dems/Liberals as "naive" or "being led by a new messiah", when all the while that is exactly what is happening to them. It's a CON that has been very well executed by Karl Rove et al to gain favor and wealth via the corporations and K Street Lobbyists he toils for.
I feel bad that many good people seem to have been deceived by the lies they've been fed for the past 30 years. (Considering 8 years of a Clinton Presidency/Republican Congress was a wash, but provided a great springboard for the hateful rhetoric to really take hold). I feel quite passionate about this election, and yet I still don't have an answer to a very specific question: Conservatives may have all kinds of reasons as to why they won't vote for Obama, but so far, no one has provided one reason to vote FOR McCain.
Yesterday,I worked at a rally for Michelle Obama. At one point I looked out from the bleachers at the crowded room and said, "If ever there was a good reason to elect this man, just look at this room." Every spectrum of every skin tone, every age, every socio-economic class sitting together, laughing, talking, sharing, and feeling joyful. Joyful! At a time when circumstances in our country are as bleak as they have been since the 1930's. One lovely 87 year old black lady from Georgia, nearly blind and walking with a cane, said quietly to me when I asked if she ever thought this day would come, "This day hasn't come yet. I'll believe it when I wake up on November 5th and they tell me he's the President."
A local woman who lost her job and then her house in the course of the past two years introduced Mrs. Obama, and Michelle beamed as the cheers and the signs went up and electrified the gym. It was wonderful and fascinating, and made me very proud that all of the speakers, Michelle Obama included, spoke of hope, of love for our country, of taking responsibility for our future, of bringing our soldiers home and providing tax relief for those of us who so desperately need it. NO hate speech, NO rhetoric, NO ugliness~just a mixed tableaux of colors and faces talking and laughing and working together. It was pretty breathtaking.