Disillusionment

Look, I get it, I understand, okay, maybe understand is too strong of a word, but I sympathize with you. I don’t like it much either. I feel similar to how you feel.

            Oh, sorry, I’m talking about the current political situation in our country.

            Recently the state I live in, no, not confusion, although there is something to be said about the vast differences of beliefs and opinions in Virginia, we had our primary election. On super-Tuesday no less and as usual, I went and voted. Like I have for the past thirty years of my life, and as usual, at the end of the day, the candidate I voted for did not win. This of course, was no real surprise to me.

            You see, I can’t say that I’ve actually voted for a winning candidate at any level of politics since the 1980’s. That is a very long losing streak for me. Almost something to be proud of actually, for lots of reasons, the primary one; I can always say, yes, I voted, yet my candidate didn’t win. And then I can move on to speculate how the candidate that I voted for would have handled the political situation better or worse than the seated elected official.

            So, moving on… when I woke up on Super-Tuesday, I still didn’t know who I was going to vote for. Even when asked by no less than twenty people leading up to Super-Tuesday I didn’t know whose name I was going to put my “X” next to.

            You see, none of the candidates, and I mean not a single living soul running for president, actually has said or done anything to prove to me that they have either been in my situation, understand my situation or even sympathize with my situation. This of course is a generality. A generality that most people seem to not realize for themselves during this time of hype in our season of rebellion.

            As a general rule, I don’t trust politicians or anyone who wants to be in charge of anything. I don’t believe any promises or platforms they stand on. I’m tainted by life. Yet I dream of a better living for my child and a future where people get along, listen to each other and leaders willingly admit they don’t know everything and have the answers to all questions. What I suppose I’m saying is, I want a leader who will listen.

            Listen to their advisors.

            Listen to the poor.

            Listen to the rich.

            Listen to the manufactures.

            Listen to the sick.

            Listen to the well.

            Listen to the right.

            Listen to the left.

            Listen to the middle.

            Listen to the employed.

            Listen to the unemployed.

            Listen to the angry.

            Listen to the forlorn.

            Then, when they’ve listened, they sit back with smart people and try to figure out what the best solutions to the problems they’ve just encountered and move forward.

            Instead, what I get to see and hear are people with inflated egos talk over each other about how great they are and how many accomplishments they’ve acquired. I get to hear them insult each other in smarmy tones all for the laughing public.

            I get to witness wedges driven into American people and divide those same people into categories and then watch them point fingers at each other in disgust and hate. I get to see loving and caring people turn into hate mongering name callers and others turn into media martyrs. I get to hear from all sides that if “So and So wins, I’m moving to Canada, or Brazil or Costa Rica.”

            I’m sick of the division our so-called leaders are forcing upon us. I’m sick of the rhetoric and I’m sick of the vitriol on both sides.

            Where is the great unifier? The person or people who want to bring us together instead of drive us apart. Where is the person who talks of love and forgiveness over fear and apathy; a person who’d rather do what is best for all and can convey that sentiment for all to understand instead of trying to build walls and canyons between the classes in our country?

            T.H. White said “The Destiny of Man is to unite, not to divide. If you keep on dividing you end up as a collection of monkeys throwing nuts at each other out of separate trees.”

            Which it seems is happening throughout the caucuses of this year. Everyone seems to be pointing fingers at everyone else and saying the problems we are experiencing lie with the current or old administrations. Maybe they have a point. Maybe they don’t. All I know is that if you or I pointed a finger at a co-worker or supervisor at work and said the things the people who want to be our leaders are saying then we’d most likely be fired or at best sent to Human Resources for sensitivity training. Yet when the talking heads do it, they are applauded. They hold themselves above the masses and the rules the masses follow and are offended when they are asked why they don’t have to follow the rules. Or they deflect the question by pointing out the shortcomings of someone else or point to an individual or group of individuals and state “that’s where the problem is. Blame them.”

            I hate this mentality.

            We are supposed to be better than this.

            We are supposed to be great in all things.

            We are failing.

            I want to be able to change our society for the better yet wanna-be leaders only seem to want to make us hate each other. I hope we as a society are smarter than what they are giving us credit for. I dream of a country that has put to rest the demons of its past and work toward a better, happier and more peaceful future.

Eleanor Roosevelt Said “Pit race against race, religion against religion, prejudice against prejudice. Divide and conquer! We must not let that happen here.”

Disillusionally yours,

Skip.