Wild Ride

The next four months are going to be a wild ride.  An ugly political campaign will weary this country and divide further an already divided country.

I make no apologies for being liberal.  I believe in living in a country that values what everyone brings to the table, sometime that means that some of us bring extra because someone is struggling to put food on the table, pay the rent, afford to put gas in the car to get to work. I DO NOT believe that those people are in their circumstances because they drink beer and smoke cigarettes or that they use drugs and are lazy.

I do believe that we all start out in different places and at some point everyone of us will need to turn somewhere for help.  When I needed help my parents, none too thrilled I had just become a and unwed mother, were on the road in four hours from Idaho to Texas to rescue me from an impossible situation.  A situation that I created myself, I was in over my head and scared.  My parents cared more about my safety and of Jacob than they did that I had turned away from the way they raised me.

Not everyone has such a tightly woven safety net and sometimes even if they do unforeseen circumstances require that people ask for help. I want a country that provides a safety net, a place that sees helping others as an investment in them. Providing the kind of support that helps move them toward something better.  Some people won't ask for help, that's fine participation isn't compulsory, but don't decide who and who doesn't deserve help.  Have you walked in their shoes? Faced their choices?  Frankly I don't care why someone needs help, because if I'm ever there again I would hope that someone wouldn't stand harshly in judging why I need it.

Are you confident enough of your own hard work and righteousness that you think you might never need help, or that you haven't already benefited in ways you won't acknowledge from a safety net that protects us all?

I am so disappointed that Mitt Romney has chosen the path of least resistance in vilifying the poor.  His attacks about "welfare reform" being undone are outright lies and with little research anyone who wants to know the truth can fund it, but it is a convenient political target and we should expect more from any political candidate.  I cringe watching both side pillory  each other, it almost makes one too cynical to vote. ALMOST!