Yes. We can.
In 1990, the Republican nominee for governor of Minnesota was a far-right hardliner named John Grunseth. He made the rather conservative Democratic incumbent Rudy Perpich seem suddenly liberal by comparison, and the GOP was enthusiastically banking everything on him. Near the end of the campaign it suddenly came out that he had certain vices involving minors, and he was dropped from the ballot and replaced with the more-liberal-than-Perpich Arne Carlson, who went on to win the election. The MN GOP leadership shrugged and grinned ruefully and said, “Well, yeah, we always kinda knew there was something, y’know, funny going on, but he was a strong champion of conservative values, so…”
And with that, I knew everything that I would ever need to know about conservative so-called “values”.
Not that I was a stranger to conservatism; the Cult of Reagan had been completely failing to hide their fangs over the preceding decade, but I had always been willing to grant that there must be some self-styled conservatives who, however wrong, were at least sincere and genuinely principled. In 1990 I was shown that such mythical beings must be so rare as to be almost non-existent, and irrelevant even if they did exist (Note: I do know one. Exactly one. After over four decades, I know just one. Only… one). In the nearly two decades since then conservatives have not only reinforced this conclusion, they have made their predecessors seem almost humane by comparison.
What separates liberals from conservatives is this: Liberals have a functioning moral compass to guide them, whereas conservatives have only whatever this week’s set of talking points happen to be.
After these last eight years, to vote Republican one has to be nursing a deep and pathological hatred of America. No other conclusion is possible; no other position fits the facts. They hate America, they victimize our children, they have contempt for law and common decency, they are pathologically dishonest and completely abjure the most basic critical thinking skills.
Their hatred of America is displayed in the illegal and contemptible practice of voter suppression, a long-standing Republican tradition. In the dismantling of common sense regulations in order to feed greed at the expense of the American people. In ignoring warnings of a threat to America and then using the resulting attack as an excuse to lead America to war against a nation that had nothing to do with that attack and posed no threat to us. Hatred of America is found in locking the minority party almost completely out of the legislative process by denying them entrance into the meetings of the very committees they serve on and barging into meetings they put together themselves and shutting them down. To vote Republican, you have to believe that all of that is perfectly acceptable.
Victimization of children is in denial of medical benefits for them and their families and in deliberately degrading the educational system under the Orwellian boast of “No Child Left Behind”.
Contempt for law is displayed in a Justice Department that fires attorneys who refuse to waste time and resources on obviously bogus claims of voter fraud and replaces them with unqualified partisan idealogues. In an Attorney General who declares that everything the President decides to do is legal by definition, simply because of his title. In torture and extraordinary rendition. In declaring that torture ceases to be torture merely by redefining it. In keeping emails about government business hosted off the system designed to archive them and then deleting them when they become inconvenient. In catching white supremacists in the act of plotting the assassination of a Presidential candidate - with sniper rifles, even - and dismissing the whole thing as a minor drug case. To vote Republican, you have to have been snickering about these things all along.
Contempt for common decency is found in pridefully boasting of one’s foreign policy and military decisions and then denying ever having said those things when they turned out wrong, as predicted by those who were paying attention. In pointing an accusing finger at citizens who point out dishonesty and ask reasonable questions and demand accountability before the law, calling them “disloyal” and “unpatriotic” or even “traitors”. In using race-baiting as a time-honored campaign tool.
Critical thinking skills are what allows one to recognize that redefining science to make it more palatable to religious idealogues is both damaging and treasonous to our students and teachers, and to recognize that those who demonize you for pointing out what they’re doing are not sincere, honest, or decent people but thugs and vandals. They allow you to see that a voter registration drive that finds questionable entries in their forms and flags those entries to the attention of registration judges is, by definition, NOT engaging in voter fraud.
Pathological dishonesty is in found in trying to redefine a progressive tax code as “Marxism”. It’s found in the reality-free bloviations of every right-wing talking head and blogger.
Can we free America from such horror, from such vile and monstrous thugs?
Yes. We can.
We can take America back from the anti-American filth who’ve imprisoned her these last eight years and restore her to the American people. But only if we vote. And if the Republicans don’t manage to steal their third presidential election in a row.
I vote for Barack Obama not because I am a “liberal” or a Democrat but because I am an American. I vote for him because I uphold ideals, rather than regurgitating ideology. I vote for him because I am an adult, and recognize the importance of having adults in charge of things that matter. Like America. I support him because I hold the Constitution and the principles it espouses to be of vastly greater importance than a flag pin. I stand for him because he stands for me, my family, my friends and my neighbors, even those who disagree with him.
I vote for Barack Obama because he has made “Country First” an unmistakable guiding principle, where John McCain made it into an empty slogan.
I do not “worship” Barack Obama, nor any other man or alleged god. I merely find him to be the right man, in the right place, at the right time. I find his record (yes, I have actually looked deeply into his life and work) to be admirable, compelling, and inspiring. His has been a life of service. And before you ask - No; I do NOT respect John McCain’s “service”. There is nothing heroic in McCain, nothing of genuine service. His entire life has been based on using family connections - first of birth, later of marriage - to advance his ambitions when his own pitiful lack of ability failed him over and over. As he has failed America over and over. As he would fail us again, if given the White House. If there were ever any doubts about his character, his campaign has certainly stripped them all away; he is a vain, shallow, narcissistic, egotistical, selfish, tantrum-prone hollow shell of a spoiled child playing at being a man. He is beneath contempt.
And if he takes the White House, well, we’re fucked. The Republic will be dead, sacked, and burned.
But now, I vote. Right now, my hope is stronger than my fear. And for that, even if nothing else, I owe Barack Obama my sincere thanks.
Senator - dare I say President? - Obama, I am a citizen, a patriot, a husband, and the son and father of enlisted men of the United States Armed Forces, and I thank you.
Barack Obama is often described as our generation’s JFK. I’ll go much further; I find Barack Obama to be rather Jeffersonian. Like that great man he is both a pragmatist and an idealist, and sufficiently brave and intellectually agile to balance those qualities and put them both to work. And in times like these, where a frat boy turned would-be tyrant hath refuted his assent to laws, that most wholesome and necessary for the public good, a man like Obama is no less revolutionary.
And my hope is stronger than my fear.
Yes. We can.
Good luck, everyone.
