...I'm okay with being REALITY-based.




Monday, April 07, 2003
      ( 10:42 AM )
 
Happy Birthday
Just a shout out to my brother, Jon, in the Gulf - Happy Birthday, kid. Hope there's not too much sand in your shorts for you to enjoy your day. (Wish you were home to celebrate.)


Mama Musings
It's gray and rainy outside today (I know, not much of a shocker for Portland). But I just wish the sun would come out for an entire day. That would be nice. We met our new neighbors yesterday - and it was great. We all got together for an impromtu baby shower for our next door neighbors who are due in exactly a week. It was fun to get together and talk about things like a new life coming and painting houses and things that had nothing to do with war, killing, betrayal by the government, etc. It was a relief, actually. Amazingly, the Kid was a doll the entire time and charmed everyone - which may or may not have been good for the expectant couple. He also got to play for the first time with kitty cats and a big dog. He loved the animals - he just giggled and screached in delight when the dog licked his face, and he loved to touch the soft kitties. He crawled around at top speed chasing the cats (I'm not sure what the cats thought of it). It was fun to see him have so much fun with the animals, I'm glad he wasn't scared - he didn't even think to be scared.

I wonder what that's like. To not know you should be scared - or at least wary of something. I wonder if that's part of the psychosis going on in the administration. Oops, back to politics. Well, now that I'm there. I had a big chat with my Dad the other day. He is a 30-year veteran and just moved to Oregon after 15 years in the DC suburbs. He was arguably conservative. But since this administration came in, he has been struggling to define his own politics. I wonder if this is happening with a lot of previously-content republicans. He told me that while he is still conservative thinking on things like abortion and is a strong supporter of the military, he definitly has changed his mind on the death penalty and he's very much moved toward the left on social justice issues. He is more libertarian-leaning when it comes to fiscal matters and taxes, but then again, he feels that Ashcroft is from Mars and the entire administration is completely out to lunch in terms of what their goals are for this foreign policy. He still thinks dems should "get over" 2000, but he's not sure he'd vote for Bush in 2004.

One thing he said made sense to me, though. He said that in his view, just the election of a different president won't make much difference, it hasn't in the past. I thought about this a lot. I think it would depend on who was elected, but if it were like the past elections, he's right. The power of the status quo to maintain is really strong. I don't know if the grassroots people in this country are willing to work hard enough to elect someone who actually would enact change. Of course, that wouldn't happen if we got Lieberman, or probably Edwards. But sometimes it seems to me that anything would be better than what we have now. But that could be desperation talking because it all just seems so horrible.

In the end, I think this country gets the leaders it asks for. While I don't believe that Bush legitimately won the white house, the fact that his ratings have been through the roof for most of his tenure tells me that something is hinky. While I lend a lot of credence to the incredible propaganda power of the corporate media, it falls to the citizens of this country to choose its leaders decisively. There is no excuse for allowing this leadership to remain in office. I wish that the polls didn't make it seem like the majority of this country doesn't have a brain in its head. But then again - perhaps this is the decline of our culture and country. If that's the case, then the poll results would be accurate. It's disappointing. While I'm motivated now to get involved in the local Dean campaign, I am secretly praying that whoever does end up the Dem candidate won't make it toooo hard for me to vote for him. I'm not hopeful considering how it seems like the DLC always gets its way. Sigh.

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