Crying about the Election

“Why are you crying?” her mother asked 4 year old Abigael Evans this week.

“I’m tired of Bronco Bamma and Mitt Romaney,” she said between sobs. 

Nearly nine and a half million people have watched the 22 second video her mother made of Abby’s tears and Mom’s attempts to reassure her that the election is next week, it will be over soon.  Turns out Abby had heard one too many election reports on National Public Radio and just lost it.

I’m writing this column before Election Day.  I’m also close to tears.  Hopefully I won’t be crying afterwards.

We cry because we are sad, tired, hurt, lost.  In 12-step programs we talk about HALT, hungry, angry, lonely, tired – dangerous times, trigger times, crying times.  Time to halt, ask for help.  The American electorate is ready to HALT all this electioneering.  We’re hungry for something besides false advertisements, tired of paranoid whipped up fears, angry about manufactured conspiracies.  An angry person is often a lonely person.  There is so much anger in American these days, on all sides of the political spectrum, name calling, labeling, lies.  I’m especially angry about the one billion dollars spent on this election, more than on any previous one. How many hungry, poor, lonely, homeless crying kids could that have fed?

A later photo shows a much happier Abby sporting a pin she received from NPR.  When the radio execs saw the crying video, they wrote to apologize, saying they too were tired of the election, tired to tears.

We’re all tearfully tired of it.

By the time you read this, if it’s Tuesday night, we will hopefully know who is the next President of the United States, how many Republican and Democratic representatives were elected and whether one party has control of the House or Senate.

Plus whether Dave Potter or Mark Del Piero won in Monterey. (BTW, I ended up voting for Dave; I just can’t vote for a Republican.  Sort of like The Economist’s endorsement of Obama – I chose the devil I already know.)

I say “hopefully we will know” because already there are predictions of a rerun of 2000, contested elections, allegations of voter fraud, a split between the popular vote and the electoral college vote, and another trip through the courts to another nightmare of so-called democracy by a stacked Supreme Court.

One commenter wrote about Abby’s tears: I don't think that the little girl is crying because of the election coverage. She is crying because no matter which side wins, her generation is basically screwed. The United States Economy has been little more than a massive Ponzi scheme for decades and it will crash and burn in her life time.

School often teach civics by holding mock elections, even in elementary schools, kids holding debates, solemnly casting ballots.  It turns out young people mostly vote Democratic.  Likewise, this year and most years, polls show that women are overwhelmingly Democratic voters. 

Maybe women and children vote Democrat because they cry more easily.  They can cry for the 47% whom Romney scorns.  They can cry for the raped woman who doesn’t accept, as several Republican candidates do, that God willed her attack and pregnancy.  They can cry for the victims of Superstorm Sandy and cry out that government should provide disaster relief.  Mr. Flip Flop No Tears Romney says the private sector should take care of storm victims, that he would cut funds for FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency.  That is, he said that during the debates.  But last week he said of course he supports FEMA.  I bet he can turn his tears on and off too.

I knew a woman minister who wrote her dissertation on women and tears.  She tried to get a grant from Kimberly Clark, the leading maker of Kleenex, arguing that women were their best customers.  They turned her down.  (That’s the private sector for you, so sympathetic.)  But she went on to write, among others things, that women often cry when what they are really feeling is anger.  And conversely men often get mad when deep down they are really sad, and should HALT, and have a good cry.  Maybe all those angry white male Republicans need to use their tear ducts, rather than lies and fists and guns.

I imagine all America will be crying Tuesday night, tears of rage, or tears of relief.  Then, like the Eastern seaboard, we’ll have to wipe our eyes, roll up our sleeves, and mop up the mess.

Copyright © 2012 Deborah Streeter

Should I Vote for Dave or Marc?

All politics is local.   Every US election cycle over 1 million elected offices are up for grabs, and most of those are local.  There is a lot more to this election year than Romney/Obama.

My California ballot is almost ready to mail.  I’ve checked my choices for President, US Senator, and some local reps to the State Legislature.  As usual, I am a Democratic girl.

And I’ve checked yes or no on the 11 California propositions, a regular feature of our ballots, where we get to vote on issues or policies that our elected official can’t or won’t decide on themselves.  This year there are issues like ban the death penalty (yes), require labeling of genetically modified food (yes), and allow some sleazy exemptions on car insurance that we voted down last election but the millionaire insurance exec who bankrolled it got it on the ballot again (no.)  (A weakness of our proposition system – the bar is low to get things on the ballot and money, as usual, lowers the bar further; there are two other millionaire funded props. )

But there is still one line to be checked; who should I vote for for Monterey County Supervisor, District 5?  Dave Potter or Marc Del Piero?

That’s where politics gets local.  If Barack Obama isn’t elected, or Senator Dianne Feinstein, my life isn’t going to change too dramatically.  Well actually it will, and more so the life of my kids; war, taxes, judges, freedom of speech, separation of church and state, health care – yes, this is a crucial election.

But my County Supervisor deals with issues much closer to home: water, garbage, roads, development, environmental protection, fire protection.  I have first hand experience talking with the current Supervisor on all these issues, and he has been very helpful.  I have agreed with most of his positions.  He gets stuff done.  I have called him, mad about local issues that might not seem as important as Obamacare or tax relief, things like a badly placed stop sign or ugly giant mandatory garbage cans, and he has even returned my calls. 

But I am wavering about voting for him again, voting for him a fifth time actually.

That would be Dave Potter, the incumbent, running for his fifth term.  He has run barely opposed in previous years, so wide has been his support.  He is a progressive type in our county where reside many powerful and very rich (in money and land) farmers and other business people who want more and more, building, water, roads.  He often is the sole vote against a big golf development or building a highway through town.  He is trying to bring back train service to our area.  He waived the permit fees for our local volunteer fire brigade when we finally raised the money for our first ever firehouse, and came to the dedication.   That’s local politics.

But this year he has a real opponent, Marc Del Piero.  And in the primary election in June Del Piero actually got more votes than Dave Potter, and forced this run-off – Dave hasn’t had to endure a run-off for years.  So what’s happening?

When we say that politics is local it’s not just because local issues are important, but because locally we can see government and politicians in more detail, close up, flaws and pettiness.  And for me at least, I notice much more closely my own flaws and pettiness, my curious reasons for voting one way or another.   For example:

Dave’s been a Supervisor for 15 years.  Most of the accomplishments I note above were in his first couple terms.  Recently he’s been hanging out with LA businessmen trying to build a race course on a local closed down army base.  He says that will help our economy.  But what about his early promises to keep that land as park and open space?  He used to represent us statewide on the powerful Coastal Commission, but his term ended amid some controversial votes in favor of coastal developers in other parts of the state.  Maybe it’s time for him to go, for fresh blood.

That’s what Romney says about Obama – he tried, he did some good things, but not enough, and he’s changed, become out of touch, even corrupted, time for new blood.

One of our biggest local issues is water.  We don’t have enough, only the modest 30 mile long Carmel River, to supply 100,000 people on the Monterey Peninsula.  We’ve pumped so much water the ground water is retreating and sea water intruding, bringing salt water to artichoke fields.   Some want to build a desalination plant, which would help make more development possible.  But where should the plant be and at what cost and what damage to ocean life and what energy costs and greenhouse gases?  The various cities and agencies and county and state water resources people can’t agree.  The farmers are powerful and take lots of water from the river and now the new groovy wineries want agriculture exemptions from water rationing.  It’s just a very big complicated mess.

Dave has been working on water issues for 15 years and nothing has changed. Marc on the other hand is a water resource specialist lawyer and gotten water deals and desal plants in place in other communities.  Maybe he could break the log jam here?

This sounds familiar too.  Bring in a business expert, says Romney.  Sometimes you have to fire someone, said Clint Eastwood.

One of Dave’s old friends and cronies serves on the Water Resources Board and is under indictment for conflict of interest. 

McCain tried to slam Obama for the shady company he kept, radicals and socialists.

Del Piero has a reputation for being very aggressive.  He admits he can be combatative, but that he gets things done.  Potter’s weakness seems to be he is bit free with the truth.  Neither is a saint.  Both are politicians.  I asked a friend who runs a water treatment plant in a different town which one he thought would be better.  “They’re both really obnoxious,” he said.  “In meetings, who would I rather be with…..”  He couldn’t decide. Finally he said he thought Potter was slightly less sleazy.  Faint praise.

We often hear about the bad tempers of politicians, mostly in private, chewing out staff, demanding action.  There’s only one woman of the five supervisors, and for a while there were no women; maybe guys just get stuff done by yelling at each other.  Does it matter if I vote for the really aggressive guy over the extremely aggressive guy?

I pay attention to endorsements.  Dave’s got the whole Democratic machine behind him and lots of local enviros and progressive types. He’s paid his dues.  Many of my friends support Dave.

But Marc, a Republican, has picked up some curious endorsements from groups who are fed up with Dave.  Like the local Green party, of all things.  The local Sierra Club chapter was so disgusted with some of Dave’s positions, they simply didn’t endorse anyone in the race, after years of endorsing Dave.  But some Sierra Club staff are working for Marc.  And I have friends on his list too, mostly folks who feel betrayed by Dave.  I pay attention to that.

Sometimes my vote is against the obviously bad guy rather than for the only so-so good guy.  Bush/Kerry.   Is Dave bad enough that I would vote for a Republican, something I have never done in 40 years of voting?

Help!  I need to mail in my ballot this week.

Copyright © 2012 Deborah Streeter

Pop Quiz: Election Vocabulary and Quotations

This election season seems more and more like a horrible family feud. For months (years) now it’s like our nation is at a contentious holiday dinner of arguing relatives, but played out messily in public.  Like any dysfunctional family, we yell at each other or sit in stunned silence and ask, “Did he really say that?” “Would he really do that?”  “He never used to talk that way.” 

It’s getting worse as Nov. 6 approaches.  Mitt Romney’s son Tagg said this week after the debate that he wanted to “take a swing” at Obama.  I’ve had my fantasies about doing bodily harm to someone – Tagg?   Like crazy cousins we citizens think it’s ok to lie, or exaggerate, or threaten.  Most of us just wish the whole thing were over with and we could go home to living most of the time with our own kind. 

If you want real election news and analysis, take a look at Ed Kilgore’s column Political Animal.  But even he’s getting pretty tired of it, and he’s a political junkie.

All I can do this week is offer this quiz of election vocabulary and quotations.  Which is the correct answer?

1. “Binders of Women”

a) What Romney says his staff put together after he was elected governor as a way to find qualified women candidates for his cabinet; apparently he didn’t already know any qualified women.
b) A collection of names of qualified women actually put together before the election by a bipartisan coalition of Massachusetts women’s groups and presented in a set of binders  to Governor-elect Romney.
c) Cultures and people such as historic China and the contemporary fashion industry who restrict women’s power and ability to move by forcefully imprisoning their feet.

2. “That’s Just Not True”

a) Obama’s way of saying “You’re lying again, Governor Romney.”
b) Obama’s version of Joe Biden’s “Malarky, Congressman Ryan.”
c) Missouri Senate candidate Todd Aiken’s description of date rape.  (He says it is “just” for men to be able to rape their dates, and it’s “not true” that this is rape.  He also says “that’s just not true” that pregnancies ever even occur after so-called “legitimate rape” so it’s unnecessary to permit abortion in those cases. He is leading in the polls against a fine smart woman candidate.)

3. “I apologize.”

a) What Obama told the world on his “Apology Tour,” according to Romney.
b) What Romney and Bush have never said.

4. Who said: "I'm concerned about the poor in this country. We have to make sure the safety net is strong and able to help those who can't help themselves. I'm not terrible worried about the very wealthiest in our society -  they're doing just fine."

a) Romney.
b) Obama - the very wealthiest are doing just fine at telling lies and paying for elections with Super PACs and sleazing tax breaks.

5. “Romnesia” is:

a) An ideal gated community for the 1% where it’s ok to bully, lie and take a swing at your opponent.
b) A medical condition suffered by Romney.  Obama identified this serious disease this week and kindly reminded his opponent that it is covered by Obamacare, because it is a longstanding preexisting condition.  He carefully outlined how to recognize the symptoms, in order to prevent the further spread of the disease. 

6. Nevada is called a "swing state" because:

a) It's a great place to swing: "What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas." Unless you are Prince Harry.
b) A close election is predicted there, since unemployment and home foreclosures are the highest in the nation.

7. The headline: "Cardinals Remind Team How to Win" refers to:

a) NY Cardinal Timothy Dolan prayed at the Republican Convention, "We ask your benediction O God on those yet to be born..." Then when he was reminded that clergy can't endorse candidates and keep their tax-exempt status, he offered a prayer for the Democratic Convention team as well, and said (perhaps about marriage?), "Show us anew that happiness is found only in respecting the laws of nature and of nature's God. Empower us with your grace so that we might resist the temptation to replace the moral law with idols of our own making, or to remake those institutions you have given us for the nurturing of life and community."
b) A St. Louis baseball player whose great hit got his team into the Major League playoffs. This headline and the coverage of the baseball playoffs in general are bigger and longer than political news these days.

8. Who said, "My pension isn't as big as yours?"

a) Obama to Romeny in the second debate after Romney alleged that Obama also has pension investments in China. Romney's pension is the income form his $30 million in investments. Obama's pension, which he followed the law to report publicly, unlike Romney, is between $50,000 and $100,000 and comes from his service as Illinois state senator.
b) The 50% of Americans lucky enough to have a pension, to the 1% whose pensions are like Romney's.

9. When Romney says "Marriage is between one man and one woman; it's been that way for 3000 years, and must stay that way," he is referring to:

a) his polygamist great grandparents who went to Mexico to escape US persecution,and where his grandfather was born.
b) his great-great grandfather who had twelve wives and was murdered by the husband of the twelfth.
c) biblical patriarch Abraham who had two wives, Sarah and Hagar.

10. "Wild Pitch" means:

a) A baseball thrown so hard and errantly the catcher can't hold it, sometimes resulting in extra bases for the other team.
b) "I will not cut taxes for the rich." Romney at the first debate.

Extra credit: 

The editorial “Too Many Mitts: The President Has Earned Another Term” appeared in the newspaper of the religious hometown of which candidate? 

Copyright © 2012 Deborah Streeter

There’s a Place for Us

For a city that is so alive, pulsing 24/7, New York City seemed full of death this weekend.  It was probably just me.  I flew east, dressed all in black and went to the funeral of my beloved New York aunt.  At night I could hear sirens screaming, quite a change from my quiet home in the Big Sur redwoods.

But my biggest encounter with death in New York was an afternoon at the huge Greenwood Cemetery.  Over half a million people are buried in this Brooklyn 19^th century landmark, 500 landscaped acres in the middle of a gritty industrial and residential part of town.  Here lie famous New Yorkers (Leonard Bernstein, Boss Tweed, Henry Ward Beecher, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Mobster Joey Gallo, Louis Comfort Tiffany) and many anonymous as well (4600 Civil War dead.)  Ornate Victorian sculptured mausoleums stand next to mass graves of soldiers and fire victims. 

In most towns I visit I go to the cemetery. I love the history, the folk art, and the nature; I am inspired and moved.  I spent so much time in my local cemetery in Monterey, California that I started leading tours there, telling stories about its famous and infamous residents (Doc Ricketts, Richard Farina, Quock Moi.).

Americans in death, as in life, practice segregation; in the Monterey Cemetery (Cemeterio El Encinal, Cemetery of Many Oaks) there is the Catholic section, a Chinese and Japanese section way over at the far edge, even a Russian section.

As a minister I’ve led my share of memorial services (over 200, I would guess).  This past week I sat in the pew at the somber and respectable Upper East Side Anglican service for my aunt.  We heard the King James version of I Corinthians (“I spake as a child…”) and the rector intoned the rite of commendation (“Into thy hands O Lord we commend thy servant Nancy, a daughter of thine own redeeming.”)  We even sang the hymn “Jerusalem” although I didn’t quite get what the dark satanic mills had to do with her life.

But I tried not to analyze too much and just to worship and give thanks and ponder the mysteries of life and death.  Hearing my cousins and their children speak of Nancy Angell Streeter, I couldn’t help but imagine my kids at my funeral.  Serious thoughts.

Entrance to Greenwood CemeteryThe next day I visited Greenwood Cemetery with my 30 year old son, who lives very near it in Brooklyn. Through the ornate Victorian entrance we walked up the hill to the highest point in Brooklyn, where you can look west to Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty. On that hilltop a bronze, helmeted statue of Minerva, goddess of both war and peace, looks west toward her sister goddess, Lady Liberty. Erected by Victorians to mark the site of the 1776 Battle of Brooklyn, the first battle of the Revolutionary War, Minerva raises her arm in seeming salute and question to her sister: will these soldiers and immigrants ever live in freedom, ever live without war?

Surrounded by these hundreds of thousands of graves in this bucolic setting it’s hard to picture the raging Battle of Brooklyn on this hill, William Howe commanding the British, George Washington the Continental Army, both sides totaling 40,000 men including the British Navy in the Harbor.  It was a resounding defeat for the Americans and the British surrounded them there in Brooklyn.  But under cover of a foggy night Washington and his 9000 men were able to escape in the night in boats across the East River. 

Goddess Minerva waves to Statue of LibertyA few years ago newspaper headlines read “Goddess Minerva faces hardest battle yet.”  A developer wanted to erect a building that would have blocked those two female embodiments of our better selves, liberty and peace, from being able to see each other. Public outcry forced the plans to be scrapped.  Maybe we do want to remember the cost of war, the sorrow of death…..or have these two goddesses do it for us.

Just around the corner from Minerva is the simple grave of the great composer Leonard Bernstein.  Unlike the showy mobsters and Protestant millionaires, the Jewish conductor has a modest bench with his name; people often leave small stones on it in the Jewish ritual of remembrance.

I had actually been to this cemetery once before, but it was at night, on a full moon tour they offer.  Engaging guides in period dress with two accompanying accordian players led us all over the windy hills and paths, playing appropriate music at each stop: “When Johnny Comes Marching Home” by the mass Civil War graves, and “Nearer My God to Thee” for the Titanic victims.

Some friends and I, in a convivial mood, asked if they played requests?  Since we were ending our tour at Leonard Bernstein’s grave, might they play a song of his, like maybe from West Side Story?  Maybe “Maria” or “When you’re a Jet….(till your last dying day.”)  We thought we were pretty funny.  The accordianists consulted their music sheets in the dim light, paused, and slowly started playing the love song of the tragic lovers about to die, “There’s a place for us, a shining place for us.  Hold my hand and we’re half way there, hold my hand and I’ll take you there…somewhere, someday.”

Copyright © 2012 Deborah Streeter

That’s Debatable

We’re in debate season here in the U.S. 

(Last week I said we were in earthquake season.  We are also in football season, baseball playoff season, and back to school season.  For weeks they’ve been selling pumpkins for what they now call the Halloween season (it used to be one day!).  Oh yeah, it’s the season of autumn.)

67 million people watched the first televised Presidential debate this past week between Mitt Romney and Barack Obama.  There are two more, Oct. 16 and 22, plus a Vice Presidential one Oct. 11. 

Personally I’ve always found these debates very painful to watch live, but I watch them later on You Tube.  I recommend that, if only for the theater, the opportunities to yell at the screen, “Answer the question!” and the feelings of superiority that surely you would be a better moderator. 

The next morning headlines screamed in surprise that Romney had won, because he was so vigorous, assertive, that Obama seemed distracted, passive.  After awarding victory because of body language, commentators eventually noted that Romney seemed to have changed dramatically from extreme right to the middle, modifying if not outright rejecting and even denying his previously promised policies.  He sounded like the Governor of Massachusetts who had created proto-Obama health care.  When he denied ever wanting to cut taxes for the rich, Obama seemed asleep.  Finally, a day or so later, people, like our friend Ed Kilgore started counting up the lies Romney told; fact checking groups agreed there were 24 Romney lies in 37 minutes.  That’s how you “win?”

Some major things were missing in the first debate. Glaringly absent. Maybe they will show up in subsequent debates? 

We’ve had a big to-do in recent weeks over the “replacement referees,” high school and college refs who worked the first few weeks of the National Football League season because the regular refs were on strike.  After a series of really bad calls and public outcry, the refs and owners finally settled last week.

It seemed we had only “replacement candidates” at this debate, along with a replacement moderator.  We want the real guys.

So the first things that were missing were the real candidates and a real moderator:

The Real Romney: If there is such a man.  He changes his tune so often.  At the debate he just threw out the window many of his long held positions.  Was this the move to the center that candidates often make in the last month – campaign to the extreme in the primaries, become more moderate in the general election? They finally shook the Etch a Sketch.   Our friend Ed Kilgore disputes even this, saying Romney was just more enthusiastic about his lying that usual, but his positions really didn’t change that much.

The Real Obama:  He was flat and uncombatative and did not call Romney on his lies.  Since that night he has come out swinging, in ads and appearances.  But his supporters were sadly disappointed that night.  Frank Bruni in the NY Times said Obama "was definitely playing to maintain his lead and willing to risk blandness if it saved him from coming across as a bully. But he used less then a quarter of the ammunition available to him, even as Romney fired bullet after bullet after bullet." (Why so much violent imagery?) Some others pointed out the challenge Obama always has in coming across as an angry black man - too scary for those poor white gun owners.

A Real Moderator: Veteran retired 78 year old newsman Jim Lehrer, who has been moderating debates since 1988, was widely criticized for vague questions ("What would you like to ask your opponent?) and horrible time management, allowing all kinds of interrupting, going over time, wandering off topic. Someone said he was a potted plant. Even the replacement refs called penalties, albeit inconsistently.

Other missing items:

Third Parties:  There are other people running for president – Green Party, Libertarian, Peace and Freedom and ten other parties with at least some electoral votes already.  Where are they? 

Important Issues like Immigration and Women’s Health Care:

The topic of this first debate was supposedly “domestic issues.”  All they talked about was money; jobs, the economy, regulations, taxes.  There are many other domestic issues besides money, such as immigration and women’s health care; these have widespread impact, and the candidates differ sharply about them.  And they are issues upon which the President can act decisively by himself (sic) (ie without Congress) and which affect what judges they nominate.  And if we want to stick with money issues, immigration reform would have huge economic impacts.  And women’s work lives and contribution to our economy would suffer tremendously if we aren’t free from unplanned pregnancies. 

Another Important Issue Missing: Science and the Environment: No questions about the environment, Keystone XL pipeline, air quality standards, climate change.  Oh, I forgot, Mitt did say, “I love coal.”  But Obama, who made climate issues central to his 2008 campaign, has been timid and calculating in his silence this year.  Shame on you.

ScienceDebate.org put it this way before the debate: 

In a recent poll almost 85% of likely voters said they wanted the candidates to hold a debate on Science. Why? Because, more than anything else, our kids' future health and happiness depend on it. And yet, in spite of the many critical issues involved, I'm willing to bet that almost none of the following questions get asked in any of the debates:

What does science know about climate change, and as president what will you do about it? What about the disastrous state of our oceans where entire species are at risk of extinction? What can we do about the oncoming crisis of fresh water scarcity? What will you do -- if anything -- to encourage the development of alternative energy sources less damaging to the environment? How much are you willing to spend on the space program which informs us not just about the scope and beauty of the universe but about the health of the earth? What about vaccinations and public health, the safety of our food, or lack of it, and the dangers of global pandemics and deliberate biological attacks?

Too grim? Too apocalyptic? Too "global"? Then how about some down-to-earth questions about science and the American economy? Science and technology have been responsible for over half the growth of the U.S. economy since WWII. Much of this economically bountiful innovation came as a result of government investment in scientific research. At what level should this continue? Or should big government get out of the way entirely? And where are the American innovators of the future going to come from when a recent comparison of 15-year-olds in 65 countries found the average science scores among U.S. students ranked 23rd, while average U.S. math scores ranked 31st.

Decent Press Coverage and Analysis:  It was all about who won, not what the substance was. Winning seemed to be defined as being energized, even loud and bullying, rather than offering reasoned arguments (“too professorial”.)  Much attention to “zingers” and disappointment at how few there were. 

It took a few days to get fact checking reports (see my column of Aug. 19 on the topic of lying and fact checking) and by then conventional wisdom had set in that Mitt had a win, lies or not. 

The New York Times even reviewed it as a piece of entertainment on the TV page:  “Theirs was a glaringly public confrontation that looked oddly intimate and personal. And that may help explain why tens of million of people tune in — there is nothing else like it on television. It’s not a gladiator fight, or a boxing match or the Super Bowl; it’s not a quiz show, a singing competition, a beauty pageant or a finale of “Survivor.” If anything, these confrontations look more like a dispute in couples therapy: neither partner can really win, but either one could get rattled and blurt out something unforgivable.  That scale-tipping moment didn’t happen.”

George W. Bush:  That’s for me the most glaring missing factor.  Why doesn’t Obama ever say his name?  He’s not Voldemort.  (Well, maybe he is.)  Occasionally Obama will say about Romney’s plan to cut taxes for millionaires, “We’ve tried that and it didn’t’ work; it got us into the mess we are in now.” But even then he doesn’t capitalize on the Democratic scorn and Republican shame about Bush.  Bush, now totally absent from public life, was the first ex-president in 50 years not to attend his party’s convention.  Someone wrote that for the Republicans not to have George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney at their convention made the GOP not a political party but a witness protection program.  It’s like our nation has had that memory erasing thing from Men in Black waved in front of our eyes.  George who?

Can’t wait to watch the next debates.  At least we are having the first woman moderator in 20 years.

Copyright © 2012 Deborah Streeter