Puyallup Fair DEM Booth...

I volunteered for four hours at the Puyallup (Western WA State Fair) today... all by myself. My booth-mate didn't show up. I had a wonderful time, though...

There are a lot of really wonderful people out there, very excited about the Presidential race. The DEMS seem happiest; the GOPers seem sullen and angry (but then, I was standing inside the DEM booth, so I reckon they wouldn't look any too happy gazing upon the contents of my booth and the many, many people who were crowded into it picking up bumper stickers and buttons by the dozens, cash in hand to help pay for a DEM victory in November. When I walked by their booth later, there was hardly anybody there.).

Laurel (older sis) and I will be voting for Obama, but Jackie is adamant about voting for McCain.
Even though she believes as Laurel and I do on the vast majority of the issues, she thinks Obama stands for "more government" and she "HATES" government. I tried to explain to her that the only government she has lived under most of her life has been a corrupt, greedy, it's-all-about-rich-people "trickle-down" government, so if she hates it, she ought to vote to change it, but she doesn't "get" that.

There was a time when people loved, respected and honored the federal government. I remember the people who died to give us a representative government that would take care of all its people in time of need, and Jackie has never lived under a government like that. So she would rather stay with what she has than consider what government would be like if we voted in ways that make it responsive to the needs of everyone. That doesn't necessarily mean more, bigger programs. It means addressing the needs of those who, despite working three jobs, can't make ends meet... it means being ready to care for hurricane victims... it means "being there" for the common defense... instead of diverting to a war that didn't have to be fought when we should have been going to Afghanistan with all guns blazing. It means living more to the tune of the Golden Rule than to the law of the jungle: survival of the fittest (richest).

She has bought into the fear-inducing Bush sound bite, "Better to fight them over there than over here." Well, Iraq didn't attack us; Afghanistan did. And I pray to God that the terrorists DON'T adopt the same philosophy: "Better to fight them in America than over here." That’s the height of arrogance, to me. If it's suddenly okay to invade another country without provocation, the way we did in Iraq, then we're no better than those who attacked us on September 11th! Of course it's kosher to defend against another assailing country, but we didn't do that. Iraq was a diversion, pure and simple, not a sane response to the terror attacks of September, 2001.

Anyway, I'm just disgusted by her GOP-at-all-costs mentality. I feel almost like Jackie would if she worked all day at a bank and found me outside holding up a picket sign against it. She has the right to vote for whomever she wants, but she doesn't study the issues at either of the candidates' websites. Instead, she listens to sound bites and talking heads and drinks in the fear that Obama's opposition works so hard to inspire. It scares me that the rest of the country may be doing exactly what she's doing to "become informed." HORRORS!!!

If the GOP gets in again, the Supreme Court might reverse Roe vs. Wade and other laws that allow us to live our lives in freedom. I agree wholeheartedly that abortions should be rare, but I don't think they should be outlawed in all cases except to save the life of the mother, because if they are, many desperate women who have been raped by strangers, relatives or others will be committing suicide and having back-alley abortions with hangers again. Jackie agrees, but she thinks it's still fine to back McCain-Palin, who will probably be appointing federal court justices during their tenure(s). Now, I can see a 100% right-to-lifer going for McCain-Palin -- I would have NO issue against someone with that rock-solid a belief in the sanctity-of-life-from-the-moment-of-conception-- but to have Jackie willing to have our federal government take away that choice from others without exception just infuriates me.

I can't understand how a person can vote against her own interests. She must be utterly brainwashed by long years of well-earned loathing of " big government." Thank God for big government during the Civil War years, during the Great Depression, and the New Deal. Ya know?

Big government isn't the issue. CORRUPT, ELITIST, UNSYMPATHETIC, UNRESPONSIVE GOVERNMENT is the issue. We have one now. It needs to be fixed. I don't see anyone truly in a position to bring it to repentance other than Obama. McCain doesn't even seem to recognize that we have serious economic or ethical problems in the federal government. And if I had seven homes and a multi-millionaire wife, I might not, either. (As a born-again Christian, I find it hard to believe I could be that myopic, but who knows?)

Someone who's in touch needs to be at the helm. McCain admitted last week at that forum that he was "divorced from reality."

I am just beside myself with worry over the course we'll be taking in January, 2009. I pray to God it's Obama, even though I know that's saddling him with a burden that no one should be asked to bear. He'll be digging through decades of acculumated manure looking for the pony for years -- and we need to be ready to understand that and help!

People running for President this year ought to have their heads examined!

Pray for my sanity during the next 49 days. I'm almost apoplectic over the closeness of this election. It should be a freaking cakewalk for Obama this year, except for racism, sexism, fear, lies, and other entrenched diversions...

ARGHHH!!!! Are we willing to let America go down the tubes without a fight?

Shame on us, if so. Shame on us.