If you can't use a Scan-Tron, you're not an American.
I voted today. It was the first time I've stood in the poll and everything. It was all cool until I went to actually get my ballot. Next to my name was a little red message: "Not verified by the Dept. of State." This little message sidelined me while the worked handled everyone else's problems (most of them were people voting in the wrong precinct) until they finally got back to me with someone calling downtown to figure out what to do. No one locally, or even at the polling headquarters could tell me what that meant. Creepy.
Three people were marked into my "you're a really annoying person" list:
1. Girl in line with me who very blatantly walked up next to me to be helped, instead of getting behind the other four people behind me.
2. Pidgin-English speaking woman who hadn't filled out her voter registration, and kept insisting that she was told she could vote just by bringing her driver's license to the polling place.
3. Man near my father's age who didn't understand that on election day he would have to vote in his own voting precinct. Then he complained that that wasn't advertised. I finally interrupted him and said, "But that's the way it's always been. For all time, you had to do that." Advertising...
I said it before, this campaigning and voting and campaigning is like the hand-job that will not end, much as you'd like it to. It could turn out great and how you wanted it to, or it could be kind of disappointing; but the media and the candidates themselves just cannot stop tugging you.
I find myself increasingly disgusted with how people treat politics as some sort of divisional line of society, and worse, expect you to forgive them for their outlandish shortsightedness, ignorance, arrogance or rudeness. I respect that some people are not comfortable voting for Barack Obama. So be it. I even respect that some people think that marriage should be defined by the constitution. I respect their right to their opinion and their decision to support it with a vote. I sincerely do.
But I'm sure that someone would find it offensive if I said that a vote for McCain is a vote for destroying the country. Especially if I said it repeatedly. And loudly. And in as many places as I could. So why is it that I, a semi-rational independent, must endure the endless slings and rants and obnoxious posturing of the American conservative/Neo-Conservative/Pro-life/Pro-Palin/Pro-drilling-regardless-of-the-irreparable-damage-it-will-cause? And should I bother to voice my opinion, no matter how neutrally and politely expressed, I am shouted down as a communist, socialist, etc.
Everybody says they want to fix the country or the world, or whatever. But no one has bothered to address the simple fact that no one know actually how to listen to one another. I think if we sat America down to a table, we would find that the overarching principles that founded our homeland are not the ideas and ideals we are upholding today.
Since when did it matter what you did if it wasn't against the law?
At what point did our nation decide we should govern the world? And if we can nail that down, why? And if you can nail that one down: Is this what we declared our freedom from England for?
It was said by someone smarter than me that America is really two nations: Black America and White America. I think there's many more than that and until we find something we can collectively agree on, I think we're heading towards ripping ourselves to shreds.
Three people were marked into my "you're a really annoying person" list:
1. Girl in line with me who very blatantly walked up next to me to be helped, instead of getting behind the other four people behind me.
2. Pidgin-English speaking woman who hadn't filled out her voter registration, and kept insisting that she was told she could vote just by bringing her driver's license to the polling place.
3. Man near my father's age who didn't understand that on election day he would have to vote in his own voting precinct. Then he complained that that wasn't advertised. I finally interrupted him and said, "But that's the way it's always been. For all time, you had to do that." Advertising...
I said it before, this campaigning and voting and campaigning is like the hand-job that will not end, much as you'd like it to. It could turn out great and how you wanted it to, or it could be kind of disappointing; but the media and the candidates themselves just cannot stop tugging you.
I find myself increasingly disgusted with how people treat politics as some sort of divisional line of society, and worse, expect you to forgive them for their outlandish shortsightedness, ignorance, arrogance or rudeness. I respect that some people are not comfortable voting for Barack Obama. So be it. I even respect that some people think that marriage should be defined by the constitution. I respect their right to their opinion and their decision to support it with a vote. I sincerely do.
But I'm sure that someone would find it offensive if I said that a vote for McCain is a vote for destroying the country. Especially if I said it repeatedly. And loudly. And in as many places as I could. So why is it that I, a semi-rational independent, must endure the endless slings and rants and obnoxious posturing of the American conservative/Neo-Conservative/Pro-life/Pro-Palin/Pro-drilling-regardless-of-the-irreparable-damage-it-will-cause? And should I bother to voice my opinion, no matter how neutrally and politely expressed, I am shouted down as a communist, socialist, etc.
Everybody says they want to fix the country or the world, or whatever. But no one has bothered to address the simple fact that no one know actually how to listen to one another. I think if we sat America down to a table, we would find that the overarching principles that founded our homeland are not the ideas and ideals we are upholding today.
Since when did it matter what you did if it wasn't against the law?
At what point did our nation decide we should govern the world? And if we can nail that down, why? And if you can nail that one down: Is this what we declared our freedom from England for?
It was said by someone smarter than me that America is really two nations: Black America and White America. I think there's many more than that and until we find something we can collectively agree on, I think we're heading towards ripping ourselves to shreds.