I found this poster yesterday that pretty well sums up how I feel politically. This current toxicity of partisanship between the extremes of each party is disgusting:
To me, people who knock on doors to tell other people how to live their live are the epitome of arrogance, and that goes for both the religious nuts and the liberal do-gooders. In this current atmosphere, instead of having a real national debate on reforming a broken healthcare system, we got “Death Panels” and “ObamaCare.” That irrational fear-mongering did nothing, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING, to fix the problem. Instead of having a real national debate on controlling our porous borders, we got “Human Rights” and “Racial Profiling.” Again, nothing has gotten done, and our border is sitting there wide open for anyone to scurry across.
Here’s a memo for the I’m-Right-And-You’re-Wrong extremists on both sides of the aisle: While you hold your breath and stomp your feet as your debate strategy, the rest of the world is passing us by. Our economy still might be the largest in the world, but our education and healthcare systems aren’t even in the top ten anymore. We have REAL problems that need to be fixed, and the only way to get anything done is to stop these “Who’s the bigger asshole?” contests, swallow a little pride, admit you don’t have the only answer for everything, LISTEN to what the other side has to say, and come to a workable compromise that moves legislation and policy forward.
I’ll admit that I’m guilty of poking fun and pointing out stupidity more against conservatives than liberals, but that’s because I live in a highly conservative region that, while the intentions may be good, is stuck about sixty years in the past, holding on to Cold War paranoia and believing their religion is the only one on the planet. If I were in a more liberal region, I guarantee, my brand of criticism would be aimed the other way.
Maybe we need to collapse as a nation and suffer through some real hard times for a couple of generations just to learn a little humility. Perhaps that would be the best medicine for the extremists to cure their arrogance. Maybe then, instead of debating about hot-button, emotionally-charged, mostly irrelevant to day-to-day life issues, we could focus on rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure and regaining our place as the world’s leader. I hope not. I hope there enough people like me who are sick enough of the extremism to save this country before it’s too late. If you are like me, turn off Fox News, turn off Keith Olberman, stop listening to the extremists who refuse to listen, and vote moderate.
Big Owl's Tree 