Senator McCain

So sorry to hear the news that Senator McCain has a brain tumor. I've not always agreed with his politics, but he has truly set an example on how to act a gentleman, even in the face of division, disagreement, and debate on Capital Hill. I really wish him well and send warm thoughts to him and his family.    Photo:Wikipedia.

Howard Zinn Was Right About Democrats and Republicans

I honestly can't get excited about politics and what politicians have to say anymore, because reality and history prove it futile to expend my energy on getting angry about what happens on Capital Hill.

The truth is that Democrats and Republicans are one in the same. Yup, I said it. They are the same in the sense that they are the elitists of society, that both sides are living the good life and prospering. They wine and dine together; they are friends while attempting to convey personas of archenemies.

Politicians are cohorts in the great masquerade called politics. And all of us ... rich, poor, working class, upper middle class ... we are all the target of their rhetoric and talking-in-circles-speeches because they need us to vote for them. Both sides need all of us to take sides and fight and protest and passionately defend our respective candidates despite knowing - deep down in our core - that our elected officials will do nothing to change our lives. Despite all the fear-mongering they employ (which definitely drives votes), new laws, new rules, new budgets, new social programs will have no real impact on any of our lives. 

Rich people will stay rich.
Poor people will stay poor.
Working class people will stay working class.

There is a reason why politicians work so hard at getting re-elected and spending decades on Capital Hill ... because it is lucrative for them. Politicians continue to hope we won't notice how comfortable of a living they make while they are in office. The cars they drive, the clothes they wear, the investments they make, the luncheons they attend, the security they enjoy, top-notch healthcare plans, yearly cost of living raises all come from securing our votes and spending our tax money.

We are the backbone of their financial well-being and we demand nothing in return.

Notice that if we write our legislators about an issue, we most likely will receive a canned response in the form of a generic, preprinted letter with the politician's stamped signature at the bottom of it, telling us all the reasons that nothing will change their mind about their legislative decisions regardless of our concerns. That's quite a kick in the ass after we hit the campaign trail for our candidates: we worked phone banks, we manned obscure campaign offices, we balanced signs with our candidate's name and face on our cars, we littered our lawns with those same signs, we went door to door and let people scream in our faces and got chased by dogs, we collected signatures, we drove elderly strangers to the polls on election day to pull in more votes for them, and we voted for them -- all the time thinking our candidates cared about us and would do what is best for us and would (somehow) make our lives better.

This is some crazy shit, because politicians don't change our lives. We are the only ones who can change our lives. 

It's all on us.

The late Howard Zinn, an absolute social activist, talked about class warfare and the relationship between Democrats and Republicans way back when. We should pay attention.

"When the Democrats are attacked for [inciting class warfare] they shrink back. They don't say what obviously should be said, "Yes, there is class warfare. There has always been class warfare in this country." The reason the Democrats shrink back is because the Democrats and the Republicans are on the same side of the class war. They have slightly different takes. The Democrats are part of the upper class that is more willing to make concessions to the lower class in order to maintain their power."                                                   HOWARD ZINN, interview, Identity Theory, Jan. 10,2001