Has anyone talked about the election yet? No? Good!
So on the 4th I went to vote before work - not very hard to do. Lots of people, but the people working the polls had it together.
Everyone at work was on tenterhooks the entire day, although perhaps that was just projection. But no, the election and the persons involved dominated all conversation. After all, we've learned from the past couple of elections that you never can tell what will happen when voter disenfranchisement has become a standard tool in the Republican toolkit.
I got home intending to go out and watch returns, but ended up just going to bed by 8:30, without hearing anything concrete about the results.
And the clock radio woke me the next day with news that Obama had won. And all I could think was Thank. God.
Speaking of God, I'm not at all religious - being raised in a fundamentalist Christian church and then realizing you're gay for no apparent reason beyond the fact of who you are is apt to make you reject organized religion pretty swiftly - but I was praying a lot on Tuesday, in the prayer-as-outlet-for-wanting-to-send-positive-vibes kind of way. And I cannot tell you how thankful I was on Wednesday - to God or the universe or the American people or whatever. I made sure to send out several prayers of thankfulness just in case, in the prayer-as-method-of-acknowledging-your-good-fortune kind of way.
I was somewhat saddened by the outcome of California's Prop 8, and I've become moreso when I see how much sadness and anger it's generated among those on my friends list. It does indeed suck, most of all for those whose marriages are being invalidated by the passage of the initiative. But then it can be dealt with through the courts, and it's been shown time and again that nothing allows bigots to oppress minorities like a good ol' ballot initiative. They're such obscene cudgels. So I can't say I was at all surprised by the outcome. I would have been ecstatic if the initiative had been defeated, but it also would have felt a little bit lit like we'd been catapulted to the land of rainbow marshmallow fluff and dewdrop unicorns. Considering what other minorities have had to go through to get rights, we're still fast-tracked even with this defeat, and this is far from the end of anything; it's just one more hangup on a road where there's no turning back, at least not for long.
But the election of Obama has had an incalculable effect on how I view the world and life in general. I've been reflecting for the past couple of weeks on what the past eight years have been for us as a country. Well, maybe not for those who are still Bush supporters, but I think it's the general consensus that that group is made up entirely of the irredeemably evil and the irredeemably stupid, and I've come to the point where I've written those people off as beyond hope. We finally have a litmus test for basic humanity, and his name is George Bush.
Anyway. Now that we can finally see the end of the Bush administration, I'm able to look back some on his tenure, and I'm overwhelmed by what I see. I may not be religious, but I know evil exists. And I know it when I see it, and the White House has become a beacon of evil from which no good news can be expected or hoped for. Grossly incompetent when not actively working for the select few at the expense of the entire world, Bush should be grateful that he's genetically incapable of shame or remorse, because he'd be instantly destroyed if he were to suddenly experience a moment of self-reflection.
And the thing is, we all know it. This country, this world has suffered for eight years knowing that America is ruled by a man and an administration bent on its own tightly-focused and malignant agenda. So for more than 22% of my life, I've lived with that knowledge. It's funny, because government is such a distant thing in a way. I work, I play, I have my friends and pastimes, I eat and sleep and to an extent the President seems to have very little bearing in how all of this plays out.
But I know that my sister lives in New Orleans, and I can't think of her without remembering how unconscionably long it took the government to respond to Katrina with aid that is still woefully insufficient to what is needed. The hardware of my brain has been permanently altered by the horrors of 9/11, and the horrors of the ensuing occupation of a country that had no direct involvement in the perpetration of that preventable and previously-forecasted tragedy. I know that I'm lucky to lack the means to travel outside the country, because the United States is not the only country, and those other places see what's happening here, too, and don't like it one fucking bit. Even without having to buy gas, I'm struggling with debts that began accruing while I was still employed full-time. I don't think about it, but I still know that any phone call, any email, this very journal entry could be monitored by government agencies, who are just fightin' terrism, whatever that means. The dollar means less, and I'm certainly not getting any more of 'em, although it's clear that plenty more is being funneled to those who have more than enough already.
In a million ways, both small and large, these past 8 years, the past 22% or so of my life has been the worst period I've ever experienced. And while it certainly can't all be pinned on the government, and while some of this would have happened even if Bush had never taken office, it's all been made worse by our national government, and just knowing all of this has cast a pall, like having a stone in your shoe for 8 years.
I went to a chiropractor for a while, earlier this year, when I could still afford it. My neck has been bugging me. But it turned out that I also had a rib that was significantly out of joint from my spine, something that had happened maybe a year and a half earlier. And it hurt initially, but I never did anything about it, and the pain lessened and I forgot about it. But only because my body had learned to compensate for the dislocation by hunching over, which ended up causing the neck problems I now have.
It was a revelation when the chiro popped the rib back into place for the first time. Wow! Sittin' up straight! Walkin' tall! Movin' freely! I hadn't done those things in so long that I'd forgotten it was possible to do them. And it took multiple visits before my body relearned the right way to work and the rib started staying in place and not needing the adjustments anymore. (Sadly, I think I've backslid since I wasn't able to complete the therapy, given financial constraints.) But I was able to do all of these things I'd forgotten were possible, once the underlying problem was found and dealt with. And it was amazing.
McCain might also have provided some relief from the pain we'd gotten used to living under with Bush, if only he'd stayed true to the man he was prior to his nomination and not drunk the Neo-Con Kool-Aid. Because we've forgotten that government can be anything other than malignant - it can be benign, or it can be beneficial. And McCain would have provided better government than Bush, if he had stayed McCain; even with Palin and the Neo-Con pandering, he may have gotten a grip and been a tolerant ruler.
But for me, Obama's election has been the push that popped the rib back into place. Hope is a word that has been ridiculously overused during this campaign, but it summarizes what I feel now, after having had absolutely no hope for so long, a good 20% of my life. We had an election, and an astounding number of people participated, and they made a choice that I'm delighted with. Yes, Obama's still a politician, and he'll make concessions to big business and religious zealots and all kinds of unsavory types. But I believe he will think of more than the chosen few, and I'm thrilled to have an inspiring presence in the White House again, and I feel like his election makes a breathtakingly positive statement to the rest of the world that the United States is committed to honoring and representing all of its people. We need eloquence and thoughtfulness after these years of brutish ham-fisted violence and suspicion and greed and disconnection and evil, and Obama will give us those beneficial graces. I am thrilled to have this man as the new face of our nation, and I have hope that we'll undo the damage that we've learned to live with. I'd say something about Morning in America here if the phrase hadn't been ruined previously.
Of course, we're far from out of the shitcloud. Noone does angry like the Neo-Cons, and noone does dirty politics like an angry Neo-Con. Just ask McCain - it's probably an important reason why people didn't vote for him. Neo-Cons and others will resent Obama for his liberal outlook and for his race, and it'll be a hard fight even with Democratic majorities in the House and Senate.
But the old Neo-Con playbook failed spectacularly in this election. People have seen it for too long, and they're tired of it. And the importance of this change cannot be overstated. If we can capitalize on their new-found awareness, we can do more than repair the damage of the Bush Administration in these next four years - we can utterly destroy the Religious Right as a political force. There will always be a politics of hate and fear, but it will have to take another form. The one enduring good that can come from 8 years of George Bush is an enduring mistrust of religious conservatism without any ties to the reality-based community. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on... if you fool me a second time... okay, fool me once... well, you just won't fool me again.
Everyone at work was on tenterhooks the entire day, although perhaps that was just projection. But no, the election and the persons involved dominated all conversation. After all, we've learned from the past couple of elections that you never can tell what will happen when voter disenfranchisement has become a standard tool in the Republican toolkit.
I got home intending to go out and watch returns, but ended up just going to bed by 8:30, without hearing anything concrete about the results.
And the clock radio woke me the next day with news that Obama had won. And all I could think was Thank. God.
Speaking of God, I'm not at all religious - being raised in a fundamentalist Christian church and then realizing you're gay for no apparent reason beyond the fact of who you are is apt to make you reject organized religion pretty swiftly - but I was praying a lot on Tuesday, in the prayer-as-outlet-for-wanting-to-send-positive-vibes kind of way. And I cannot tell you how thankful I was on Wednesday - to God or the universe or the American people or whatever. I made sure to send out several prayers of thankfulness just in case, in the prayer-as-method-of-acknowledging-your-good-fortune kind of way.
I was somewhat saddened by the outcome of California's Prop 8, and I've become moreso when I see how much sadness and anger it's generated among those on my friends list. It does indeed suck, most of all for those whose marriages are being invalidated by the passage of the initiative. But then it can be dealt with through the courts, and it's been shown time and again that nothing allows bigots to oppress minorities like a good ol' ballot initiative. They're such obscene cudgels. So I can't say I was at all surprised by the outcome. I would have been ecstatic if the initiative had been defeated, but it also would have felt a little bit lit like we'd been catapulted to the land of rainbow marshmallow fluff and dewdrop unicorns. Considering what other minorities have had to go through to get rights, we're still fast-tracked even with this defeat, and this is far from the end of anything; it's just one more hangup on a road where there's no turning back, at least not for long.
But the election of Obama has had an incalculable effect on how I view the world and life in general. I've been reflecting for the past couple of weeks on what the past eight years have been for us as a country. Well, maybe not for those who are still Bush supporters, but I think it's the general consensus that that group is made up entirely of the irredeemably evil and the irredeemably stupid, and I've come to the point where I've written those people off as beyond hope. We finally have a litmus test for basic humanity, and his name is George Bush.
Anyway. Now that we can finally see the end of the Bush administration, I'm able to look back some on his tenure, and I'm overwhelmed by what I see. I may not be religious, but I know evil exists. And I know it when I see it, and the White House has become a beacon of evil from which no good news can be expected or hoped for. Grossly incompetent when not actively working for the select few at the expense of the entire world, Bush should be grateful that he's genetically incapable of shame or remorse, because he'd be instantly destroyed if he were to suddenly experience a moment of self-reflection.
And the thing is, we all know it. This country, this world has suffered for eight years knowing that America is ruled by a man and an administration bent on its own tightly-focused and malignant agenda. So for more than 22% of my life, I've lived with that knowledge. It's funny, because government is such a distant thing in a way. I work, I play, I have my friends and pastimes, I eat and sleep and to an extent the President seems to have very little bearing in how all of this plays out.
But I know that my sister lives in New Orleans, and I can't think of her without remembering how unconscionably long it took the government to respond to Katrina with aid that is still woefully insufficient to what is needed. The hardware of my brain has been permanently altered by the horrors of 9/11, and the horrors of the ensuing occupation of a country that had no direct involvement in the perpetration of that preventable and previously-forecasted tragedy. I know that I'm lucky to lack the means to travel outside the country, because the United States is not the only country, and those other places see what's happening here, too, and don't like it one fucking bit. Even without having to buy gas, I'm struggling with debts that began accruing while I was still employed full-time. I don't think about it, but I still know that any phone call, any email, this very journal entry could be monitored by government agencies, who are just fightin' terrism, whatever that means. The dollar means less, and I'm certainly not getting any more of 'em, although it's clear that plenty more is being funneled to those who have more than enough already.
In a million ways, both small and large, these past 8 years, the past 22% or so of my life has been the worst period I've ever experienced. And while it certainly can't all be pinned on the government, and while some of this would have happened even if Bush had never taken office, it's all been made worse by our national government, and just knowing all of this has cast a pall, like having a stone in your shoe for 8 years.
I went to a chiropractor for a while, earlier this year, when I could still afford it. My neck has been bugging me. But it turned out that I also had a rib that was significantly out of joint from my spine, something that had happened maybe a year and a half earlier. And it hurt initially, but I never did anything about it, and the pain lessened and I forgot about it. But only because my body had learned to compensate for the dislocation by hunching over, which ended up causing the neck problems I now have.
It was a revelation when the chiro popped the rib back into place for the first time. Wow! Sittin' up straight! Walkin' tall! Movin' freely! I hadn't done those things in so long that I'd forgotten it was possible to do them. And it took multiple visits before my body relearned the right way to work and the rib started staying in place and not needing the adjustments anymore. (Sadly, I think I've backslid since I wasn't able to complete the therapy, given financial constraints.) But I was able to do all of these things I'd forgotten were possible, once the underlying problem was found and dealt with. And it was amazing.
McCain might also have provided some relief from the pain we'd gotten used to living under with Bush, if only he'd stayed true to the man he was prior to his nomination and not drunk the Neo-Con Kool-Aid. Because we've forgotten that government can be anything other than malignant - it can be benign, or it can be beneficial. And McCain would have provided better government than Bush, if he had stayed McCain; even with Palin and the Neo-Con pandering, he may have gotten a grip and been a tolerant ruler.
But for me, Obama's election has been the push that popped the rib back into place. Hope is a word that has been ridiculously overused during this campaign, but it summarizes what I feel now, after having had absolutely no hope for so long, a good 20% of my life. We had an election, and an astounding number of people participated, and they made a choice that I'm delighted with. Yes, Obama's still a politician, and he'll make concessions to big business and religious zealots and all kinds of unsavory types. But I believe he will think of more than the chosen few, and I'm thrilled to have an inspiring presence in the White House again, and I feel like his election makes a breathtakingly positive statement to the rest of the world that the United States is committed to honoring and representing all of its people. We need eloquence and thoughtfulness after these years of brutish ham-fisted violence and suspicion and greed and disconnection and evil, and Obama will give us those beneficial graces. I am thrilled to have this man as the new face of our nation, and I have hope that we'll undo the damage that we've learned to live with. I'd say something about Morning in America here if the phrase hadn't been ruined previously.
Of course, we're far from out of the shitcloud. Noone does angry like the Neo-Cons, and noone does dirty politics like an angry Neo-Con. Just ask McCain - it's probably an important reason why people didn't vote for him. Neo-Cons and others will resent Obama for his liberal outlook and for his race, and it'll be a hard fight even with Democratic majorities in the House and Senate.
But the old Neo-Con playbook failed spectacularly in this election. People have seen it for too long, and they're tired of it. And the importance of this change cannot be overstated. If we can capitalize on their new-found awareness, we can do more than repair the damage of the Bush Administration in these next four years - we can utterly destroy the Religious Right as a political force. There will always be a politics of hate and fear, but it will have to take another form. The one enduring good that can come from 8 years of George Bush is an enduring mistrust of religious conservatism without any ties to the reality-based community. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on... if you fool me a second time... okay, fool me once... well, you just won't fool me again.