America Chooses to Lose

Okay, I'm going to get all the bile in my system out in one post, so bear with me, please.

I have lost faith in America.

Yesterday, I looked out and saw a great nation that was under the rule of a president that we actually did not elect. He had taken the four years he had and destroyed our environmental protections, failed to defend our shores, abandoned a search for our attacker, pursued an illegal war that was little more than a personal grudge, thrown our economy into disarray, spent billions of dollars he didn't have, suggested writing bigotry into the Constitution, and pushed to keep us under the control of uncaring corporations.

But, there was no way that the American people were going to allow him to stay in office, I told myself. They're not going to ignore the damning evidence, believe the lies, succumb to the fear, and hide behind a veil of ignorance and vote this man back into office.

Then I got up this morning and found out that I was very, very wrong. America has re-elected George W. Bush as the President of the United States.

I simply don't have the words for the disappointment I'm feeling. I truly don't understand what this country is about any more. Didn't we learn ANYTHING from the Cold War? Administrations that try to influence their populations by instilling fear of the outside world can't succeed. Our nation wins by being strong, by sticking up for the tenets that we believe in as a nation. The rights of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.

Well, Life is gone. We're in a war, a war that was started against a nation that had done nothing to us. For 1100 American soldiers, Life is no longer a right they cherish. Life is also slowly being removed from us by an administration that would rather sell out to big corporations that are spewing filth into the air, raping our national resources, and perpetuating a cycle of use/discard that is choking our environment. Respiratory diseases are at an all-time high. Our air is dirtier than it has been since the Clean Air Act was initiated. Forty percent of our waterways are no longer safe for drinking, fishing, swimming, etc.

Liberty is gone. Bush's PATRIOT Act removes that. Now we're under the watchful eye of an intelligence structure that we know doesn't work. If it worked, 9/11 would never have happened. Bush is also in favor of a constitutional amendment to deny the rights of homosexuals to get married. If he's willing to write bigotry into the Constitution for one thing, what's to stop him from doing it elsewhere?

The Pursuit of Happiness is quickly going. He's paying companies to ship jobs overseas, boosting big business at the expense of small businesses and the middle class, removing environmental protections that ensure the health and welfare of the people, and adding to the national debt daily, via an unwanted war. Hard to be happy when you have no job, can't make money, you or your family are sick as a dog, and you have no idea if you'll be shipped off to fight an illegal war.

So, having established that Bush is Unamerican by his very actions, why did America vote for him? I see two reasons:

1. Despite the fact that Americans say they don't like negative campaigning, they respond to it. Bush's campaign was negative from the get-go. Kerry didn't fight back as strongly and harshly as he should have. It would have been easy to do so, just bringing up almost ANY Bush "achievement" shows his failures.

2. The Democrats do NOT realize what this country wants any more. They're stuck in an older mindset, where established candidates are the ones that can push things forward. Kerry is a prime example of that. On the other hand, look at the last two Democratic Presidents: Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. Neither of them was what you'd call an establishment Democrat - they're not from the Northeast, they're not Ivy Leaguers (Yes, I know Clinton did law school at Yale, but he didn't do his undergrad work there), and to a certain extent they bucked the system. They also were not senators - they were governors.

The Republicans, on the other hand, have gotten very good at wordsmithing and turning the nation against words such as "liberal" and "intellectual" by treating them as insults. And the Democrats have fallen right into their trap. You never see a politician describing him or herself as "liberal" any more, you hear "progressive." You don't hear them calling themselves "environmentalist," you hear "conservationist." And they defend their dangerous policies by talking about smaller government, removing the "welfare state," and railing against the "liberal media."

The second thing that frightened me about this election, even more so than the Bush victory, was the willingness of Americans to write bigotry into the laws. I am referring to the eleven issues on the ballots in state elections looking to outlaw marriages by gay individuals. In every case where this took place, they were victories, and especially in the southern states. In Ohio, ONE county voted against the issue, and it was close there.

What kind of person votes to deny basic rights to a person simply because of who they are attracted to? How does it really affect anyone if same-sex marriage is allowed? This is all connected to so-called Christianity. Now, as most folks who know me know, I refuse to call any members of the so-called "Christian Right" a Christian. I was raised as a Christian, I know what it means. It doesn't mean try to use an archaic book to justify bigotry and hatred. It means to follow Jesus's most important commandment: "My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you."

The important thing in the bible isn't to follow it all word-for-word. That's simply not possible, as it's a centuries-old compilation work which is extraordinarily inaccurate and contradicts itself frequently. Rather, take the important messages from it and follow those. And the primary one is the one I just mentioned in the previous paragraph.

At any rate, the Democrats need some new blood. And it has to be people who are clean and competent. Clinton was competent but he came with some extra baggage in the form of his personal life, and the Republicans were able to waylay his administration throught that. I hear people talking about John Edwards to run in 2008, but a one-term senator isn't going to be experienced enough to do so. Hillary Clinton is another name I hear. But if Americans aren't ready to allow gay marriage, they certainly aren't going to be up for being led by a liberal female.

But, I kept wondering during this election how things would be going if Howard Dean had received the nomination. I am quite sure he wouldn't have let Bush beat up on him the way Kerry did. Add to that the fact that Kerry had a Senate voting record that Bush was able to exploit. I'm not sure how Bush would have attacked Dean's gubernatorial record, I'm sure he would have figured out a way. But Dean would have pulled no punches in pointing out the shortfalls of the Bush administration, unlike John Kerry. Dean would have fought harder, and in a way that would have mobilized the unprecedented grassroots movement he attracted.

For my money, the best candidate for the next Democrat nomination is Howard Dean.

Until then, I will wait and see exactly what the President plans to do to re-unite America. He said in his acceptance speech, "To make this nation stronger and better, I will need your support and I will work to earn it. I will do all I can do to deserve your trust" He's going to have to work awfully hard to gain that support from the Kerry voting populace. And he's going to have to do nearly full reversals to get anything from me.