Want it all, blood, bones all of it. Never mind you might need it someday just turn on the spigot and start sending your lives work, your earnings, your retirement and anything else you might have to me. I don’t need it but I want it, dammit.
Ignorance is a terrible thing and we are a nation well on our way to being entirely and willfully ignorant. We believe anything that sounds good and fits our personal worldview, our narrow pathological, all too often simplistic and ideological sociopolitical porches.
Summer Vacation Sure Hope They Speak ‘Merican
Yes, I said porch. Most Americans have not traveled further than their own front yards, haven’t expanded their knowledge of the world beyond their most recent vacation to Disney World and the children’s ride of ‘It’s a Small World’, even that annoyed them when the song was in languages they couldn’t understand.
This is America, Dammit! Speak English.
We want our country back. We want to take our country back.
Have your heard these slogans? I certainly have and I constantly wonder about them, wonder first who wants the country back and who they want to take it back from. Then I wonder, just where the hell do they want to take the country back to?
Tea Party Rally
So what do these fearful people look like? These people who want their country back. Do they look like me? Some of them certainly do, my guess is most of them do. The difference between them and me, they haven’t the wherewithal to consider the consequence of regression, a return to our past. Then you have the new generation, those who weren’t part of the change, weren’t part of the Civil and Equal Rights battles, they don’t have a clue and are simply repeating the mistakes of the past. They have been educated in a system that promotes ignorance, refusing to provide historical context or train our young to think.
What is the result of this drive to “Take our Country Back”? It is a great question here is the answer.
VOTER SUPPRESSION.
If your ideas suck the only way to win an election is to gerrymander districts and suppress the vote. Here are two Republicans and what they have to say.
Jim Greer, Chair of Florida Republican Party
In the meantime, the GOP accuses the current Administration of attempting to block Veterans from voting in Ohio. This is of course, not the case at all. What they were attempting to do is expand early voting for all citizens of the State and keep early voting in place, not just for Veterans but for everyone. As I said previously, you are not allowed your own facts.
Patrick Murphy explains Veteran Voter Suppression in Ohio
The truth of the matter is, this is turning into the nastiest fight we have seen and we, the people are allowing it to continue without even a whimper. We refuse to hold any politician accountable and we allow media to direct the traffic of misinformation and outright lies into our homes and across the airwaves. Worse, we enable this trash into our schools so the next generation is even more poorly informed, less able to correct what has been so terribly mangled. We sit back wringing our hands thinking to ourselves, ‘Oh no, will I survive the onslaught? Will my Social Security be safe? Will my Medicare be there when I need it?” We fail entirely to consider the overarching horror story that is this nation’s future if we do not correct the regressive policies that are rolling toward us with ever-increasing vigor as we fail to take action.
In Florida the recent elections had a 6% turnout. Our apathy will be its own reward. The GOP doesn’t need voter suppression, we are our own worst enemy!
I leave you with this little diddy, one of my all time favorites I think Audrey II or Twoey is a great play on the current Tea Party / GOP. What say you?
QBG_Tilted Tiara 
Politics these days is a nasty business. How did this happen?
I don’t know, it is a great question and one we need to be asking. It is a question we should be screaming from the streets and rooftops.
We are destroying ourselves with our apathy.
Wow … a lot going on here, but I’ll keep it short.
Being in Ohio, the voting thing is nothing more than political gain … and that’s sad.
Given that with travel and communications, the world is a smaller place … and its more important that ever to be knowledgeable about other cultures …. thus pretending we’re a cocoon is stupidity, not ignorance.
PS: The voter ID laws are designed to protect against voter fraud that either doesn’t exist or only few cases of … therefore …. the reason is obvious.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/08/17/voter_id_less_than_meets_the_eye_115132.html
Oh aFrank, I know there is rhetoric on both sides. The problem? The other side (from me) admits they are trying to keep people from voting!
The cocoon starts with ignorance, ends with elected stupidity.
Liked your link by the way!
Definitely trying to keep people from voting under a disguise.
Val,
your posts are ALWAYS informative & powerful.
btw, I despise the word “tolerance.” It is used too much and It’s meaningless…. It’s not about tolerating others, it’s about loving them, accepting them, & Learning from them.
Love to you, dear. Wish you lived closer. We’d go out for wine!
Xxx Happy Friday.
Kimmy I travel all the time, one of these days I will be in your neck of the woods, I will tell you and we will meet for that glass of wine!
Some days my friend, it is about tolerating people. If we don’t tolerate those who truly get on our last nerves we would have to build really big jails to put all the politicians in.
Back at you on love and hugs!
Excellent post! I too question their “taking back this country.” We have already had a civil war. Where is tolerance?
There is no tolerance. There isn’t even good sense.
I don’t frankly care who a person is going to vote for, I demand that every person who has the right to vote be given access without impediment and that their vote be counted.
Val, they want to take our country back from the immigrants, don’t cha know? The folks with skin darker than mine and yours. You know, the folks that pick the foods we eat but whom we don’t want on our land. And before that they wanted to take it back from the Irish and the Itals and the Chinese on the other coast. You know, the folks who help build the RR and the cities. Before that? Oh, it was someone else. Someone who came over after the Mayflower Landed. Or someone who’s been here since BEFORE the Mayflower.
Well done post. Important topic. Yesterday’s decision in Pennsylvania to uphold the Voter ID law was disheartening.
The Voter Suppression Laws are ridiculous and telling. I refuse to refer to them as anything other than what they are. Pennsylvania, Florida, Ohio and all the other states. The fact that GOP members are standing up and saying plainly, this is to prevent those who have traditionally voted for the other side from voting and yet no one is stopping it is both disheartening and infuriating.
That there are people on the street thinking this is just fine, as long as their guy wins brings my to the brink of absolute fury.
The fact that Eric Holder has been cowed into doing nothing is gobstopping.
The fact that our current President continues to fight with gloves on is simply amazing.
I don’t know how prevalent cheating during the election was before but it’s become an essential part of the political process since the Bush collaboration to win Florida against Al Gore. I don’t know who they, whoever they are, want to take the country back from. I want to know what Native Indians think of that statement. The gall.
The gall indeed, I only know I don’t want to go back. That is what I know.