The Primary and General elections of 2008 have come and
gone. And the Voice of Reason lies in state. It went down with a solemn and
overwhelming vote for a promised cleanup of this country. What has become of
this nation between then and now can only be described as utter confusion.
This, in part is caused by the People--not the President. Sadly, voter turnout continues to display a
shameful lack of either patriotism or civic duty. Where other countries--such
as those where we are willing to lose our lives to defend their sacred right to
vote--have citizens willing to risk all to state their opinion about who their
leaders should be, we, for the most part, couldn't care less. In fact, we leave
the decision to the very few to decide for us our leadership, yielding our
responsibility and our interest to others. What if those who vote on our behalf
have values that are opposite to ours? Apparently it doesn't matter. What if
those who vote in our stead know little or nothing about how our government
works? Oh well. What if they are connected to all the things
we claim are the problems in our system?
What if they need a translator to read the ballot? Too bad.
It is frighteningly too bad.
In Houston, the fourth largest city in the nation, less than 13% turned
out to vote in the November 2011 election.
It was a "sleeper" by anyone's definition. But sleeper or not, the act of speaking one's
mind should never be considered optional. To Houston’s mayor, an incumbent who
just won her second term, the sleeper was to her benefit. After spending millions on her campaign and
despite having relative unknowns for competition, she narrowly squeaked out a
win. What would have happened if the
other 87% had turned up at the polls? Or, even 50%? Surveys from before the Primary race showed
Parker’s popularity dropping like an anvil—just above 30%, a statistical sign
that she would lose the election. Instead, the low voter turnout may have
favored her. This example is not the
exception. Across the nation, elections
have dwindled to virtually nothing.
In 2008, an election
in Utah was won by 8% of the registered primary election voters, which retired
one of the most statistically conservative Congressmen in the nation--Chris
Cannon. Excepting James Hansen, Cannon's
record included the highest number of passed legislation in the history of the
state of Utah. But 87% of the state's eligible voters said "so what?"
by not showing up to voice their opinion.
So a minute cross section of society decided for the bulk of that
district's citizens who was going to be their Congressman. While the winner of that race, Jason Chaffetz
often boasts winning by more than 60%, it was 60% of the 8% that showed! Bluntly put, it was The Chaffetz People who
decided for the rest of their district who would win because the rest blew off
the importance of that election. As Congressman Cannon said it, "Chaffetz
people came out and mine didn’t, the people have spoken." But that is, as they say, history--a history
that continues to repeat itself as Americans have yet to recover from their
apathy. The operative word is "yet".
While the numbers voting in primaries across the nation in
2008 were still extremely low--a pattern over many previous elections--an
undercurrent was building. The Obama administration, liberals and the liberal
media (meaning, THE media) act as if that undercurrent is a deadly rip-tide
caused by the Tea Party movement. News of their contempt for the Tea Party
people is also history. But a careful
look around, across all political sectors, shows much more than a single
movement emerging. Indeed, within the Tea Party movement itself, there is a
diverse cross section of political perspectives that have come together with
one force and one objective--reduce the size of the Federal Government. Translation: cut the spending, cut the
control of states, cut taxes, cut the crap. But outside the movement, splinter
movements, and other conservative movements have emerged. It is a focus that
has proven to scare the bejeebers out of liberals. The obvious answer is to label (or libel) the
Tea Party movement as a specific kind of people--"Bigots" to divide
and conquer, "white" to split the vote, "paranoid" to
divert attention from constitutionally destructive maneuvers, "extremists"
to prove they are not normal, and "Republican, or former-Republicans"
to put a party label on them. Nice try.
If anything, those attempts have only spawned the growth of
American activism. Thus, a new strategy
must be implemented to calm the grassroots rip-tide. That new strategy happens to be the oldest:
Fight fire with fire. Now comes, Occupy
Wall Street--the antithesis of anything Tea Party in a movement. Well, sort
of. The movement has yet to be defined.
In fact, watching a clip from Steven Colbert, who interviewed, with his classic
sarcasm intact, two Wall Street Occupiers(OWS), should put to rest any questions
about the legitimacy of this so-called (counter) movement's ability to define
itself, produce any viable solutions, or prove it is anything different than
the same 'ol, same 'ol in political griping and having a cause without actually
having one. To be fair, OWS and past "anti-" protests are not the
same. The Tea Party is actually an
"anti-" protest. But even the radical protesters of the 60's--despite
communes, and communism, "free love", and free drugs, as horrific as
those "changes" were--would not have defecated in public for
attention, or stepped in front of moving vehicles so they can claim to be
victims, or create riots then innocently look around as if they had done
nothing to start the conflagrations. Even the rioters of the 60's, and 70's had
the strength of character to claim their role in them. –And despite their
liberal and outlandish living--had a sense of dignity. So, while Soros, who
funded Adbusters, whose president, Kalle Lasn (a Canadian), started Occupy Wall
Street as a social experiment, expected this latest strategy to take down the
insurgence of activism from regular Americans a notch or two, it will fail as
well. The differences are far too glaring for the public to not easily promote
conservative activism over the OWS mess.
Another nice try.
Exercising our voice is the most important check in the
Constitution and the most challenging to maintain. The fact is that there are
people from all walks of life emerging from the ground sick and tired of an
acid reflux government. The people may
not see the ulcers forming, but they sure feel it in the gut! Unfortunately, there are still far too many
Americans willing to blindly go their way without a single care about what is
actually happening to their society. It is a frightening paradigm. Milk of Magnesia has been, at least up until
now, readily available and pretty cheap.
This kind of American is like the cat, who believes that
because its head is hidden--and it can see nothing--that its backside is safe
when it remains openly and fully exposed. For this American, slowly but surely
becoming extinct, their rude awaking is still at hand. Benjamin Franklin warned that apathy will
destroy this Republic as our country's system will not survive if we are
careless and cowardly. That has turned
out to be prophetic with our current President.
Interestingly, rip-tides are caused from two opposing forces
crossing over and under each other. One
creates a strong push forward from the top while a vacuum-like suction from
below pulls everything out to sea. Thus,
riptides are the cleanup crews of beaches and shorelines. "Rip-tide" may be an apt and
flattering description of the Tea Party and subsequent activism of the general
population--cleaning up the system. It is no wonder apathy is the worst fear of
Founding Fathers such a Franklin.
Without it there is no rip-tide to clean up collusion, corruption,
cronyism and so forth. It is also no wonder those involved in the latter fear
the upswing in American activism. Instead of fearing the rip-tide, let us help
it along with more water to increase the tide for the coming election.
Our survival as the Republic we were designed to be depends
on our activism at the polls and in our daily opportunities to speak up and
out.
