Sunday, September 2, 2012

For me, this was the last straw. I sat at the counter of a Denny's restaurant, eating chicken noodle soup as I watched Anderson Cooper on CNN. On the screen was a woman with blonde hair, flawlessly done, dressed in obviously expensive clothes and jewelry, pointing a well manicured finger at the screen as she went on and on about how too many people only want to sit around and live off the benefit of her taxes. She was so mean and so wrong in the way she made it sound like all poor people were just scum who did not deserve to live on the same earth with her.

All week I have listened to an ongoing diatribe from people attending the Republican convention accuse the poor and down trodden of being lazy and only wanting to live on welfare and to steal from them. I listened to  Anne Romney and her phony appeal to Americans to think she or her husband actually cared about us even as every other action by them clearly proved the opposite. Then we saw Paul Ryan give a speech that according to a Fox News correspondent seemed designed to set a new record for most lies in a single speech. Then came Mitt himself piling more lies on and promising exactly the opposite of what every thinking person knows is his real agenda. I've had it. Enough is enough.
My question is, where are the real people? Where are the people of integrity who despite their political or religious beliefs are loyal Americans first? When will enough be enough for the hard working honest people of this nation? What is more insulting to honest hard working people than to have an overdressed privileged bitch stand on television and accuse us of loving to sponge off her. It is easy to just say she just doesn't realize that its impossible to have any quality of life on welfare and food stamps, that very few people would choose welfare or food stamps over a decent job.

 Watching this woman reminded me of the woman my mother worked for when I was a child. My mother worked for several years for a family in Wichita Falls, Texas as a housekeeper. She nurtured their children, cooked their meals, cleaned their houses and  and provided support to this family in whatever way was asked of her without complaint. She made just barely subsistence level wages. She never took a dime from welfare, food stamps or any other government program and every day she got on that bus in time to have a hot meal on the table when I got home from school. Then one day the lady of the house became angry at my mother because she felt her children had begun to show more affection for my mother than for her, so to punish my mother she tells my mom that from that day on my mother must take her lunch break on the screened in porch where the family kept their dogs. Of course my mother quit, but she felt hurt and betrayed, and watching her cry is a memory I will never forget.
What is really crazy about all of this is that without the rest of us these rich, privileged people would not have their wealth and status. No matter how any successful person makes their money, they benefit from all of the things our society collectively provides. Even if you are on welfare, you spend that welfare money on food and supplies that these peoples businesses sell and even this pittance ends up back in the economy, circulating and contributing to the strength of our economic system. Consumers are two thirds of our nations Gross Domestic Product, without our spending we have a pitifully weak economy, that means every single one of us.
We all pay taxes that whether through the federal government, or through sales taxes and all other taxes and fees, make the roads possible for these superior people to be able to drive their expensive cars back and forth, for trucks to get their products to the places where they are sold. Our revenue provides the post office which allows them to send out bills and other correspondence more efficiently than any other such service on earth. We make the courts and police possible to protect their assets and give them a way to sue when a debt isn't paid to them. We, as a nation, from the very poorest among us to the wealthiest, collectively make this the best nation on earth to do business and we provide to the rich a quality of life unattainable anyplace else on earth so easily and with so many choices.

For these people, the ultra rich, to now point their fingers at us and accuse us of being the problem is amazingly foolish and short sighted. Even many Republicans of more sane times like Dwight Eisenhower and Henry Ford, knew that in order for the rich to thrive they must protect the rights of the middle class. But today's Republicans, led by right wing conservatives determined to return America to the stone ages socially are leading the greatest attack on Americas constitution ever in this nations history.  We must understand that what we are witnessing in America is no less than a coup attempt by ultra rich oligarchs who want to end majority rule in America. No matter how hard you find this to believe, it is exactly what is happening. Think about it; making it harder for people to vote, ending your rights to bargain collectively, dumbing down education while attempting to rewrite history. Whether they claim to be Republican or Libertarian, what they really want want is to drastically reduce or eliminate the governments as a way to take away your ability to have a say in running this country. And just as Hitler promised the German people peace and prosperity, so are today's far right extremists promising peace and prosperity through reverse social engineering that very few seem to understand can only destroy the ability of their children and grandchildren to live in a free nation and have any chance to improve their lot in life. It is exactly what a majority of the framers of America constitution feared most, and of which this nations foremost patriots from Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, on down over history to even Republicans like Eisenhower warned us to be ever vigilant to make sure never happens. This is not the first time this element of our society has tried this; rigging the supreme court and attempting to buy and rig elections so that they could establish themselves as the ruling class of America, but never before has this nation been so vulnerable to this attack. The racial climate, the decision by the supreme court legitimizing Citizens United, and the attack of right wing Christians making the ridiculous assertion that God wants to us to turn our backs on the poor and needy while taking away the rights of anyone we choose to not like has put this nation on the edge of disaster. Why is it so hard to believe that the same people who ruthlessly pollute our environment, who foment wars to make it easier to exploit other nations, who ruthlessly wage war on your right to collectively bargain for decent wages and who move their money to off shore banks to make sure it cannot contribute to the vitality of the nation that made their wealth possible would plot to end majority rule, and once they have used you, will immediately move to make sure you can never make trouble again. It ought to be so obvious.
And now these people have become so bold that they accuse us of being responsible for the conditions their actions have put upon us. What kind of person moves jobs to whatever nation is cheapest, keeps their money out of circulation in our economy, pushes for policies that make it harder and harder to survive no matter how long and hard you work and then turns around and says that  you are the problem.


Think about this, on the night that Barack Obama was being sworn in as President of the United States, a group of men met in a restaurant nearby including Paul Ryan and Newt Gingrich, and made a pact to do whatever it would take to undermine the efforts of this president. They agreed not only to obstruct and oppose any effort by this president to improve the collective lot of the people of this nation, but that the more likely it was that the president had an idea that would work, the more vigorously they would work to undermine it. They recognized that this would have a negative impact on the very people they had sworn to represent and work for, but decided that their political ambitions was more important. It would be a despicable act if it were a vow of just private citizens, but that it included people like Paul Ryan, people who are employed by us the people, in my mind makes it no less than an act of treason. Which among you work anywhere in which if the owner hires a new General Manager, and the middle managers decide they will work together to undermine him, that those people taking such action would not only lose their jobs, but if their actions caused that company financial loss, would be prosecuted and/or sued for what they had done. Now consider the much broader implications of what this action by Paul Ryan, Newt Gingrich and the others  are, the long term damage they have done to our economy and the lives of the people. How many have committed suicide because they lost everything when they might have been helped if not for Republican obstruction by congress. How many are homeless, are suffering with major medical issues brought on by the stress, worry and impossible odds placed on them by the people they elected to represent them who chose instead to represent their own political ambitions. We must demand that the US Department of Justice investigate this and if as Newt himself has bragged, it is a conspiracy to bring down our president for political gain, these people must be arrested, prosecuted and stripped of any vestige of power and privilege.

I have had enough and I pray that you have had enough too, and I pray that all of you who are decent hard working people, no matter what political or religious persuasion you happen to be will join together and demand that the people we elect to represent our vote in this government return to serving our needs rather than selling us out to the highest bidder. We must demand that the collective good of this nation must be more important in every decision and if it becomes clear that it is not, we must impeach those people, remove them from their job, take away their health care and pensions, and in the case of obvious treasonous acts, we must prosecute and imprison them. We must remember that the government is not our enemy, we are the government, and it will be whatever we allow it to be.


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