Today, I traded e-mails with an old friend. In the e-mail, I made reference to living in "Obamaha", as BHO is speaking in my home town today.
Much time has passed since I last spoke to my friend, and in her e-mail, she asked the simple question "Are you an Obama fan?".
For some reason, too much work, too little sleep, fed up, scared, or all of the aforementioned, I took off on a very passionate 'rant' in my letter to my friend.
Follow me below the jump.....for it's entertainment value, as you watch a middle-aged, reformed republican go 'high and right'.
I have voted in every election since 1976. In all but one, I have supported the Republican Party. The problem is that the Republican party no longer represents what is best for our country, or for me, or for any one else that is an average, ordinary citizen struggling to navigate their way through life.
Janet and I were supporting John Edwards until he withdrew. Frankly, I like John Edwards, but his message became too one dimentional and angry. I absolutely do not like Hillary because she represents the failed past, and would really struggle supporting her if she is our nominee.
We are actively and financially supporting Barack Obama. (He is speaking in Omaha today, hence the Obamaha reference.)
I believe that our country is quickly slipping toward the abyss, and if someting drastic isn't done soon, it will be too late on issues of the enviornment, the deterioation of civil liberties through the mantra of national security, health care, the economy, and our econimic and diplomatic standing in the world.
There are 47 million people in our country without health care, but we're told that it would cost too much as we spend $10 Billion a month on a war with no clear objective or end in sight........all the while the true threat in Afganistan is worsening as 30 young men and women die per month.
We talk about national security, yet have let 22 million undocumented aliens walk across a river and right through our pourous borders for the benefit of selected industries that are able to exploit cheap, unfranchised and powerless people.
Just try and go out and buy a car that can get better than 40 mpg, and cost less than $20k. They don't exist here in the USA unless you pay $25 - $30k. The best that I can do is to replace my aging Toyota ECHO (164,000 miles) with the updated model, the Yaris. Other vehicles exist that can get 50 - 60 MPG, but are not available here??? Why?? Good question??? We're told there is no market, when what is really meant is 'it doesn't serve our market interests."
Our leaders are pushing ethanol........a fuel that requires more energy to produce than it creates.....if you took every acre that could grow corn, and made ethanol out of it, it would not replace 12% of our imported oil, yet we have no comprehensive national energy policy, and the one that we did pass pushed back the date that vehicles have to achieve 35 mpg because we wanted to protect the American car manafactures that can't seem to compete anyway, and chose to sell us scrap iron by the pound.
We chose to ignore the Koyto treaty, and call global warming 'junk science', as the Greenland and Antarctic ice shelves crash into the sea at a frightening and ever increasing rate, and our nation endures every worsening and unpredictable weather patterns.
One of my favorite sayings came from Upton Sinclair; "When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in a flag carrying a bible."
As far as I'm concerned, the right wing, christian evangelical influence in the Republican party has taken us to a point where the line between church and state has almost disappeared. When you have a presidential candidate who is willing to use a christian litmus test to appoint members to the supreme court, we have arrived at that point. When at the state level, the republican party's platform is to outlaw most forms of birth control, including birth control pills and the 'morning after pill' because they end 'life'......when they are hell bent on overturning Roe vs Wade, when they want to strip women of the right to control their own bodies...what then?
Our president has tried to convince us that liberty and security are mutually exclusive, and that it's OK to spy on our own people. Dissent or opposition is characterized as unpatriotic, and aiding the terrorists.
Our enemies are captured and locked away, held under the new classification of 'terrorist', and denied any basic civil rights or access to any due process of law. They aren't even protected under the rules of the Geneva Convention. We have used torture on detanied prisoners, and our leadership is telling us that it was 'necessary' due to the 'circumstances'.
Enough is enough!
It's time to take our country back; back from the radical elements of the right and the rich, back from the corp interests, back from the health care companies, back from the professional entrenched politicians.
I know, I know........a very long answer to your question, but I am very passionate about the upcoming election. I believe it will be the most important election of my life time.