This is going to be a bit long...and maybe rambling. But I'm basically using this blog to work something out in my head. You can read all the way through, read it in parts or just skip it all together, but it's something that I need to do.
I had to scrap the lesson I had planned for school today. The first thing a student asked me at the beginning of my first class was, "Is Obama going to take all our money and give it to hobos?"
On this stupid island, homeless people are called hobos. I don't know why. We don't have trains. But no one wants to hear it from a dumb houlie. So instead of what I planned, we spent the whole hour - for each of my 3 classes - talking about the election and what it meant. I think I was as neutral as I could be, but not to the point of accepting the lies of either side. I acknowledged the historic perspective of the election, but I also pointed out that since last night and this morning, there have been people who have called "nigger" (note: not "my nigga"). There have been people who have been discriminated against because of the color of their skin, or their gender or some other stupid reason. This election doesn't "fix" anything. It is a
step in creating a better society.
Then, I made sure my kids understood that all the extremes that people are worried about (on both sides) are not going to happen. This guy is calm, efficient and centrist. All your money isn't going to hobos and we're not pulling our troops out of anywhere. Christ, there's rumors he wants to ask Colin Powell to be Secretary of Education. Huh?
I shake my head at people who call themselves progressives who think this is the second coming. And in the last 24 hours I've seen my...uh...man, I'm trying to get away from labels...friends who disagree, say that our country is in trouble now.
Now, I know that some of you (and you know who you are) think my - as Nart called it last week - fundamentalist lefty ways are quaint. I've been condescended to a few times and I've pretty much shrugged it off. But seriously, how could this country get into worse trouble? Forget about who's to blame - exactly how is it going to get worse? I don't make more than I did before and my taxes have never been higher. We've been in two mistakes of a war for a long time. Do you think Obama is going to bring us a third? We give billions in free money to corporations. It doesn't trickle down. Exactly what is it you are afraid of?
I promised my students that in whatever time Obama is in office, that if at some point, this country has
real, socialistic, universal health care, I will change my registration to Democrat and stay that way for the rest of my life.
I'm not sweating it.
I'm used to the media dismissing Green candidates, but the silence about Cynthia McKinney was absolutely deafening. I mean it had to be, because she was the only one putting it on both the R's & D's and the media, whether it be Fox, NBC, CNN, HuffingtonPost, whomever wanted nothing to do with the truth. And I'm sorry, but she was speaking the truth.
OK...I'll get off this and switch to something we can all agree is more important...me.
So what's a fundamentalist lefty to do?
I sent an e-mail to a few folks, some of you who read this on occasion, telling you that I'll be home for good on Christmas. One response not-so-subtly hinted that I should show up and re-take over the local Greens, as if that's what I wanted to happen before. That's not going to happen. In fact, I don't think that's going to be my future direction.
Again, I'm still working through this in my head. I called somebody up a few weeks ago to bounce the idea of going Dem and running for office in the city. That way I could get in and really change things. The more I let that run around my head, the less that appealed to me. Running as a Green doesn't appeal to me either. Oh, I still agree with the Green's platform, but I think it's just butting your head against a wall. The refusal to see more than 2 parties is stronger than ever.
There's the non-political activist route, which is vital, but I do firmly believe that there won't be real, humanistic change without change in the structure in our political system. It affects our politics (duh), but it also affects any non-political change as well. If you want to change your neighborhood, you have governmental hoops you have to jump through. Politics.
So now I'm thinking...what can be done to change the political landscape in Rochester? Run for office or run another campaign? I don't think so. But is there something that can change the way elections are run, something that is being used already in cities in the US that is proven to increase participation in government and increase discussion over solutions to problems? Why, yes there is.
But that's not enough to satisfy me. Nope. I got involved in politics and activism because I recognize that people are suffering, and they don't need to be. Many of us are not able to put themselves into generations of poverty and discrimination and think about the affect that has on mindset. I have. So something needs to be done relatively quick to break that. Can it be done quickly on a macro level? Well, yeah, but it ain't going to happen. So how can
I help deal with that on a micro level? Is there something I can do that helps people take care of the basics: food, jobs, health care, education, etc? Why, yes there is.
I think it's going to be pretty interesting when I get back. But first I need a freakin job.
