No, it's not, strictly speaking,
over yet. But even if by some miracle Kerry manages to get to the White House after every vote has been counted (that's assuming that every vote does in fact
get counted), I find myself on the verge of tears over what appears to be the direction of this nation of ours.
[... more below ...]
Ohioans (and other midwesterners) voted, above all else, for "Moral Values". And they voted overwhelmingly in favor of banning not only gay marriage, but also specifically banning civil unions. This is what we call moral values? Over 1,000 American men and women killed in a war entered on utterly false pretenses.
100,000 Iraqis -- most of them women and children -- killed. This is "Moral Values"? Corporate behemoths invited behind closed doors in Washington to loot this country of its natural resources and of its money. The rich getting richer while the poor get poorer. "Moral Values?" A CIA agent's career demolished and life threatened for political retribution. In Oklahoma, the new Junior Senator once voiced his support of the death penalty for doctors who perform abortions! Huge factories who spew forth enough mercury to make one out of every six women more likely than not to give birth to a child with permanent brain damage, and in response we simply stop classifying mercury as a toxic pollutant! A young black man caught with a $20 bag of marijuana goes to jail while Kenneth Lay is in Washington writing our energy policy!!!
MORAL VALUES?!
Can it be that the population of this country is truly this backwards, this ignorant, this selfish, this morally reprehensible? I don't think so. In my heart, I believe that if only the voters' eyes could be opened to the truth behind the rhetoric of this Republican party, that if only our miserable excuse for a national news media would start reporting facts rater than parroting spin, that if only News could win out over Gossip, that we can win back this great nation from those who hold it hostage.
And even if against all odds we have a Democratic president this January, there is a giant mountain to climb.