I'm really starting to look more and more toward a life in either Canada or Western Europe, because, and I have to be honest, I'm starting to get really, really fed up. Tonight's developments in Wisconsin merely serve to validate my feeling of hopelessness. I'm really feeling that I have less and less of a voice in this country. This is a feeling that has been steadily increasing in the past 15 months, since Citizens United. I'm very quickly losing hope in the system and I honestly don't feel I'm going to be swayed anymore by inspirational quotes by figures from a pre-Citizens United era, they've just lost their effect on me. I honestly don't know what would happen if I don't leave this country; my faith in the entire system is very rapidly diminishing. All I see in the corporate media is concern trolling about the costs of programs which benefit the poor, concern trolling about the need to cut taxes on the wealthy, and all I hear on the radio anymore is Mark Levin and his ilk. I honestly believe that I've lost my voice, even in my university.
You see, I attend Binghamton University and I was the victim of something akin to what is occurring in Wisconsin. You see, I won an election for the Student Assembly there, and was preparing to take my seat when, out of the blue, the frat buddy of the right-wing Assembly Speaker started bitching about how he wasn't allowed on the ballot (even though he didn't fill out the right paperwork). We had to do the election all over again, due to some clever maneuvering by the Speaker, and I "lost" by a single vote. The election was challenged all the way to the equivalent of a Supreme Court, who ruled that since they hadn't been in place almost all year (due to them all being impeached and removed by the Speaker last year), they couldn't hear the case. The campus outlet of The National Review controls everything in the school I attend. They're planning on changing the student constitution to replace the Supreme Court equivalent with a paid lawyer to make its decisions and eventually phase out the position of Vice President for Multicultural Affairs. Just like the rest of the country, I feel that students will fail to realize the dangers of what is being proposed and will stupidly approve it in an upcoming referendum.
All this being said, I'm hanging on a splitting string when it comes to the political system in the United States. I don't have a voice, so why bother anymore? I'm seriously considering moving out of the country (or at the very least, to Vermont) the second I graduate in 2014.
Please try to convince me otherwise in the comments section.