I had shared this on my personal Facebook page. Not necessarily because it bears repeating, but honestly I am surrounded by people on a daily basis that are of a different...er...um...opinion, yeah, opinion than me.
Ironically, although I say my voting pattern has changed, if you trace my voting history back to the Weekly Reader polls of grade school fame, one might say I have returned to my roots. It's just an observation. I am not a card-carrying member of any political organization. I am on the books in my great state registered as a third-party supporter. By the next primary, who knows what I'll be!
It's ugly out there. It really is. I have on more than one occasion feigned that I was contemplating becoming a Jehovah's Witness because they are not politically minded. Plus, with all my direct sales experience I'd be a pro at bothering people with what I am selling. (In his biography, Dave Mustaine, who was raised Jehovah's Witness, likened it to something of a MLM-type of religion.) In all seriousness, I get the whole not of this world ideal that fuels that non-voting behavior. I have a lot more respect for that then the disgruntled "the system is flawed, man" non-voters. So, I guess, in some reality I am only half-joking about joining up.
I have been spending a lot of time with people who do not view the world as I do, and it just makes me sad. I have come to realize that if you dropped out or mentally checked out of high school before 12th grade then you have completely missed the economics/civics/government portion of your education (such as it is). I can do pretty well with numbers 1 and 2 above, but number 3...wooooowheeeeeeeeeeee!
So, now, I do what I always do when I don't want to offend or wound, I offer this distraction: THE WORLD'S SMALLEST POLITICAL QUIZ. When I first took this quiz, I think I was 22 or so, and was surprised at the results. Surprised and resistant, but as my other friend's who took it felt it was "dead-on" I explored what exactly my result meant. I re-take this periodically, for fun...yes, I am just that weird...and my result as shifted as I have aged but I am no longer surprised.
See, and that's the thing about your political views, they are shaped by your experience. My experience has been a boot-strapping good-time for lack of a better explanation. I am not hard-hearted, I am just a bitch that knows that nothing is impossible if you work for it. On a statistical basis, I believe I should be typing to you from a trailer/meth lab. And past that, really, there is a lot of my human experience, that I am not comfortable sharing with other people. Too many ravenous wolves ready to shred and discredit your life into a string of juvenile diatribes.
I'll be glad when the election is over. I don't really care at this point which way it goes because of the two options that are in the mainstream, I am not really sure they are the answer or solve anything. I, also, I don't know, I don't worry about all that. I really don't. Life goes on. Like I said, in all but one of the presidential elections that I have voted in, my candidate lost. It was disappointing for a day or two or four years, but the sum total of it's effect on my life is really negligible.
Variety is the spice of life. It's unfortunate that too many of us are giant children about it all and lose sight of the things that are important in life. Truthfully, I can not control the political climate any more than I can the weather, so why waste my life worrying about whether or not it's going to rain!
I admire your calm attitude toward politics ... after all it's what controls our direction in terms of "our precious ability to vote," or not. It's "whether our government is blowing our money faster than we can make it" or not, as is certainly the case world wide today. And so average people will just need to work harder or longer, if that's even possible, or perhaps less, much less. Or get the real vision that we only have one way of surviving, such as something on the side ... my choice is sales, and giving up my good job to someone needier than I in a year or two's time :-)
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