My husband and I voted for Obama last Friday. We had been planning for it for a few weeks now, and we walked out of the voting booth with huge smiles on our faces.
I've been celebrating with everyone I know, calling them up and sharing in the excitement. I called my mom today to do the same. What she told me gave me a huge shock.
First off, I should tell you that my mom and I don't talk that often, and aren't really that close. I have probably only called her five or six times this year. I do occasionally go home for Christmas or Thanksgiving. The last time I went was a couple of years ago.
When I called her today, it was with the intention of telling her how happy I was that I had voted for Obama. Off-handedly, I asked her if she had already voted for him. She lives in Kentucky, and I wasn't sure if they had early-voting or not.
"I don't think I'm going to vote."
That was her response.
When she said that my mind froze for a second. I couldn't believe it. My mom and I had talked back in March about the primary, and she had agreed with me that Obama was the one to pick. And she later told me that she had voted. This time, though, she said she didn't see the point.
When I asked her why, she said she wasn't really sure about Obama. Horrified, I said, "Mom, please tell me you're not going to vote for McCain." Thankfully, she responded quite forcefully that she couldn't stand the man and would never vote for him. When I asked her why she wasn't sure about voting for Obama, my own personal nightmare happened. She said, "I just don't trust him. He seems to talk a lot, but he doesn't really say what he stands for."
Oh God. My mom was repeating the "all talk, no substance meme."
Now, you have to understand my mom. She is a liberal, much more than I am. She was almost as horrified that I voted for Bush in 2000 as I am now. She has always voted Democrat, and she stands up for Carter to this day. Even during this phone call she went on and on about how good Clinton was and how the way he was treated in his second term was unfair.
But, for some reason she didn't trust Obama.
She also said that she didn't think that voting would make a difference anyway because nothing ever changes.
I was mystified because she had been excited to vote in the primaries, and actually voted against Hillary Clinton, who she likes. I immediately started telling her, again, what he stands for, giving her some web sites she could check out. I told her about how the economic crisis we were facing had gone global, and that the US was about to face a very angry world. I told her that there was likely going to be an international economic summit, and how important it was that we have Obama there. I pointed out that the world respected him a lot more than McCain, and that we really needed that as well as his intelligence, the intelligence of those around him, and his obvious ability to remain calm and polite under the most difficult circumstances to help us navigate through what Europe will undoubtedly demand. She really responded to that, and overall she realized that Obama stood for everything she believes in. We talked for another 20 minutes or so before we said our goodbyes. She told me that she loved me, and my response was, "Go vote, Mom." Thankfully, she promised me she would. Then she said, "And don't worry. I will be voting for Obama." She even said that she would try and get dad to vote. If she could get him to vote for Obama it would be a miracle.
After I closed my cell phone, I began to wonder why my mom had changed her mine from being excited about Obama back in the spring to not trusting him. Especially since it was so easy to bring her back to his side again.
I came up with a few reasons.
- Her and Dad have really been hit hard by this economic collapse. My mom is bi-polar, and the company my dad works for is trying to have all mental coverage in the health insurance they offer completely dropped. This would devastate my parents. They are barely in the lower middle class, and have been struggling for quite a while. My parents are in their fifties, yet they were only able to buy their first house about four or five years ago. My mom's disability is severe. She takes extremely expensive medicine, and if she does not have access to it she will become suicidal. I am really scared of what's going to happen. Add that to the fact that because their lives have been so negatively affected by Bush's economic policies, and they were severely affected by Reagan's and H.W. Bush's economic policies,
I think I can see why she would think that things were never going to change.
- Going along with #1, mom told me that she thinks Obama will win, regardless. She probably has better reason to think this than even I do. She lives in very conservative rural Kentucky. She told me on the phone that all she ever hears is lifelong Republicans saying they won't vote for McCain (Man, that made me feel good).
I think that if you combine their situation in #1 with this, she probably doesn't think her vote will matter.
- Although she told me that all the people that she knows are voting will be voting for Obama, she told me she hears something else a lot more. Apparently she lives in an area where most people, even though they say they won't vote for McCain, won't vote for Obama. She says she thinks most of these people are just going to stay home. But, this does not mean that she hears more McCain bashing than Obama bashing. She said not a day goes by that someone doesn't tell her a bunch of the same stuff Fox News spews every single day. Apparently, the Republicans she knows have given up the idea that they will win, but they have not given up their anger and hate.
I think that since my mom used one of their meme's as her reason for not liking Obama, it is safe to say she is suffering from Orwell Syndrome. She has begun to believe that stuff.
- This also goes back to #1. She was very adamant that nothing would ever change. It dawned on me that her generation might have real reason to think that. My mom was five years old when JFK was shot. She lived through MLK, Malcolm X and Bobby Kennedy being assassinated. She lived through Kent State. She was 10 when Nixon was elected and 14 when he won again. Thanks to Nixon, Reagan, and both Bushes my parents have never experienced economic prosperity. My dad was in the army for most of the 1980s, and in that whole time, they had to live with the fact that the government shit all over the soldiers and their families. She saw one of her own daughters vote for George Bush in 2000. She was horrified when 9/11 happened. She was truly frightened that the country elected Bush for a second term. And she has had to sit back in sadness while the Supreme Court has set the clock back in this country by decades.
In short, my mom and dad have lived through what is likely the longest bad period in this country. The government has mistreated the poor while uplifting the wealthy. The government has worked against her her whole life, and it seems like half the country has as well. They have never really experienced a truly great president. My mom likes Clinton, but she thinks that some of his policies were terrible, especially in the area of crime. I think because of this she has come to the conclusion that since it has been this way her whole life, things truly won't ever change.
This vaguely occurred to me when I was talking to her. I told her something to try and make her feel better, and it dawned on me after I hung up that what I said is actually true. Yes, my parents have lived more than fifty years forced with an awful government. But, she just missed some truly great presidents. I told mom that if the country that succumbed to McCarthyism could turn around and vote for JFK, then I think this country can turn around and make things better now. I really believe this.
- My mom only gets her news from the MSM. I think this has warped her perception of how things are.
The whole point of this diary was to ask people to please make sure that every family member and friend they have is voting for Obama. Please don't think that because you talked to a friend or family member a month or so ago, and they said they were voting for Obama that that is what they plan on doing now.
I am so relieved that I called my mom before it was too late.