First, a little background. I'm a married mother of two wonderful boys, aged 9 and 7. They normally walk home from school, but today, I was picking them up because my youngest son had a dentist appointment right after school.
I left my house around 2:30 to go pay my water bill. My congress critter's local office is located in our city hall, so after I paid my bill, I decided to stop in for a brief chat.
Oh, I forgot to mention, I live in NM-02, home of Steve Pearce.
I had stopped in Pearce's office back in early August to see if Pearce would be conducting town halls during the break. He was, just not in my part of his district (which tends to lean D). So, I stopped in again to ask when he was coming. Long story short, his "people" said they didn't know, the district is very big and he can't be everywhere, blah blah blah. Typical bullshit run around.
I then began to engage, nay, challenge his "people" about the congressman's positions and failure to adequately address the needs of this part of his district. He has not introduced one piece of legislation relating to jobs (although they did say he sponsored a "jobs fair," but many of the jobs were outside this district), and he has spent most of his time sponsoring or co-sponsoring legislation that assaults health and reproductive rights. His lackeys spouted a bunch of GOP talking points, although the one gentleman claimed he wasn't "aware" of such talking points. Long story short, they fed me bullshit, I fed them facts. I left the office pissed, they were left gobsmacked by what I knew about the issues. Furthermore, they were completely unable to answer with alacrity one single question I asked of them.
I was fit to be tied. I then went to pick up my children from school. They could see that I was clearly agitated. My youngest son said, "Mommy, you look upset. What's wrong?" I told him that I had a very unpleasant conversation with some people about politics. My oldest asked what it was about.
I said, "Sweetie, there are people in this world who see things very differently than I do."
"What do you mean?," he asked.
"Well, there are some people who think that if you're poor, or don't have a job, or have lost your home, that somehow it's you're fault."
My youngest said, "They think poor people are bad?"
"Yes," I said.
"Why?"
"Well," I continued, "some people don't realize that they may have had opportunities that other people didn't, and they think that because these other people are poor and they don't have all the things they do that they, the poor people, didn't do something right, and should suffer, and I disagree. You, me, your father, we are lucky to have choices and opportunities. Some people aren't as fortunate, and there are people who don't see things that way."
There was silence in the car.
"Mom?" my oldest son said. "I know you won't like me saying this, but they're dicks."
I paused, simultaneously taken aback, yet equally proud.
"Honey, this time, I don't mind you saying that, because you're right."
Nine-year old kids are pretty smart.
Thu Nov 03, 2011 at 7:24 AM PT: Wow! Thanks everyone for putting this on the wreck list, and thanks for the kind comments about my kids. They know how to keep it real and honest.