I’ve heard it called a lot of things; from "the silly season" to one of our country’s "greatest moments". I've heard dire predictions from the faction of the Democratic party who sees Senator Obama as the nation’s "savior" and Senator Clinton as it’s death knell. I’ve heard all the rhetoric pouring forth from the mouths of the politicians and their helpers telling us who we should support. We’ve all heard it. But what I haven’t heard is an honest assessment of what We the People will be gaining from the candidate who wins.
We have gone our separate ways for many years now; we people of this nation and the two political parties begging to represent us. Forgotten in this struggle for a new champion is what has gone before. Neither political party was paying much attention to us when we were demanding action on our "issue" of losing our jobs; not to Mexican immigrants but to India and China through outsourcing and closing plants for cheap labor and fewer environmental restrictions. We were told to suck it up, get retrained and take a lower salary and to save more for our old age from that salary because our guaranteed government pension contribution FICA would not be there for us.
We were told that some far off country’s "democracy" was more important than our nation practicing what we preached while the man nominated and supported by these two parties red penned our Bill of Rights and decided to put torture on the menu of our specialties.
And we watched the two political parties protecting their turf from the aftermath of 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina; to name just two devastating and defining events of the last decade; while protecting our tax dollars from being spent at home so that they could be shipped to oil rich Iraq to bring hope and change there.
While those same political leaders, who told us they would change things in 2006 busied themselves with making sure funding would continue for a war that has lasted longer than our great Civil War, our people died from a precursor infrastructure collapse, uncontrollable wildfires, heat waves and winter storms announcing global warming. We have seen water rationing, energy rationing and are on the verge of commerce rationing once our trucks quit delivering.
And with a housing foreclosure crisis that eclipses the record set by the Reagan administration and the latest Bear Stearns bailout rivaling Reagan’s great Savings and Loan debacle, we have reentered that frightening realm that our grandparents never forgot where the word depression is now being whispered although ignored by the two political parties whose members could and should have done something to prevent depression deja vu much earlier.
But when was the last time you heard the name Bush or Cheney in this political fight? No one mentions the elephant still occupying Our White House. They fight over our Issues without any apology or responsibility for their role in making them such important issues in our lives as if they are merely a trophy to acquire. And that rogue elephant is still on the loose destroying everything in his path while we allow ourselves to be distracted by the hopes and dreams of both parties planning a political coup.
We people are the losers no matter who wins; our problems just so much election fodder, just an adrenaline rush of game play before settling back to continue business as usual.
This election isn’t about the issues, about the "best man" winning, it’s testing the limits of political power among the two controlling parties who determine our lives. This election is about Them, not Us.
If it was about Us, we would have a clear-cut plan for ending the Iraq occupation and getting our war weary troops back home.
If it was about Us, there would be an equitable plan for medical care that mirrors the one our politicians have.
If it was about Us, we would have job security at a living wage that provided our citizens of one of the richest countries on earth the basics of civilized society - food, clothing, shelter, health care.
If it was about Us, there would be an impeachment which would determine once and for all that Our Nation still had a valid Constitution which would be enforced.
If it was about Us there would be more political party accountability for supporting a shady candidate who has already been anointed by one political party at the cost of disenfranchising so many of Our Votes...once again.
If it was about Us, they would care what we tell them and what we are saying with our votes instead of telling us what we want.
If it was about Us, they would pledge to us on their honor that they would implement those changes immediately without equivocating or backing away after the Oath of Office has been taken.
Who will have this winner’s loyalty? Who has it now? I have listened carefully to these candidates, what they stand for, what they have pledged, what they refuse to budge on. When they are elected to the presidency, their loyalties must change. Old friends who did favors, religious zeal, unsavory alliances, all must end. But, just as George W. Bush’s loyalties never changed, never included any obligation to the Will of the People so must we judge the words and actions of the candidates and their old loyalties by their actions and not their promises.
This presidential election must be decided on those strong ties these candidates have, the ones they refuse to let go of. Those ties that could, and have, superseded the needs and the will of the people. All along the field of candidates has been winnowed by those ties of loyalty; to a political party, a strong religious bias, a choice of friends. Because no matter what is said, our country’s salvation lies in choosing someone not like George W. Bush. Someone with a background that holds no secret alliances. Someone willing to forgo power to follow Our Constitution’s mandate of Government of the People, for the People and BY the People.
We the People and the two political parties, who have no Constitutional standing, have gone our separate ways for many, many years now. We have created new political parties to represent our "issues" only to watch them be torn apart. And now we are watching the Democratic party being torn apart in a way that can only give Republicans a win once again. But We the People did not create this division; the party did. And we are watching the Democratic indecision finishing what the 2000 election started. You have only yourself to blame for losing this year because in order to stop the first female candidate from being elected, you were willing to supported a male candidate whose secret background resembles the guy we’ve grown to hate.
We prefer the warts we see to the ones kept hidden from us. We’ve learned that lesson well; isn’t it time all you politicians learn it too? Because, for once, party survival depends upon it. An old axiom says, "Those who live by the sword, die by the sword." The Democratic party has refused to fight for We the People for 8 long years and at the moment it’s survival depends upon that double edged sword hanging over it’s head. One edge can bring an end to Republican rule; the other will end the Democratic party. So before you choose to abort this primary race, to exclude the votes of your party members to bring about results desired by the party but not the People, look closely at the consequences because we are a highly literate country who can make sense of "fuzzy math".
And your delegate numbers do not add up unless you do what the Republican party did to Florida in 2000 and eliminate voters. We knew it then and we know it now. Only this time there is no second chance for either party. Republicans seemed to get it and played it safe by allowing their 2000 reject to "win". Democrats still don’t seem to get it, and have alienated half of the population in the United States by their sexist treatment of the lone female candidate. To them it wasn’t the candidate’s name that has produced such disparagement but the pronoun she.