Why Am I Here?

The initial reason I decided to enter the blogosphere is that our current political environment has inspired me to express myself... Not that I don't have other things to talk about. But the past four years have restored a political conciousness in me that had grown almost dormant in the 1990’s. With too much faith in Americans’ ability to discern between truth and lies, between the good of the country (and indeed the whole planet) and the undisguised avarice of a handful of over-privileged corporate royalty, I have watched our political climate transform into a storm of divisiveness by a self-proclaimed "uniter." The most important election of my lifetime has arrived.

I naively assumed that those right-wing extremist hate-mongers, the neocons, could not possibly come to absolute power. I watched as neocon leaders duped their followers into surrendering themselves, using the same tried-and-true formulae as so many who had come before… nazi-like propaganda designed to inflame the base passions of Jerry Springer Show-wannabe’s who can’t be bothered to imagine life outside the warm incubator of the spoon-fed neocon vision of “Us vs. Them” (“them” being anyone who does not contribute to the neocons’ money and/or power).

Even under the Reagan administration, the neocons seemed like they were still a fringe group. Not anymore. Power has been seized by those who seek only to feed their own greedy self-interest, the rest of humanity be damned. Calling themselves “conservative” in order to capture the demographics of the 1980’s Republican constituency, they have revealed themselves to be no such thing. Conservatism used to mean fiscal restraint and moral temperance. The modern leadership of the Republican party seems to believe “conservative” means spending money you don’t have (and lots of it), giving special favors to rich Republican plutocrats while snatching food, money and civil rights from lower-income people, and insulting the world by telling them that their opinions, rights, and very lives don’t matter to Americans. They damage they have done is horrific. If I had voted for any of them, I would be ashamed. I am embarrassed to be represented by them.

I live in a neighborhood where I am surrounded by right-wing “ditto-heads” whose political worldview is shaped by their irrational fear of cultural diversity, sneering contempt for “intellectuals,” and suburban materialism. Their rebuttal in a political argument? “Love it or leave it” (that is, love neocon republicanism or move to France). Sorry, but I love what the Constitution and Bill of Rights stand for too much to hand over the country to those who would replace those documents with dilbertesque corporate mission statements.

No man is an island, it is said, but my wife and I represent an island of liberalism in a sea of worshippers at the golden trough of neocon slop. We try forge ahead as friends’ and relatives’ regard for us changes from acceptance into undisguised derision, because of our audacious claim of the right to express an opinion.

So here I am. I hope to expand upon my ideas and offer opinions on everyday realities. Thanks for listening, I hope you'll return here.