Fundamentally Angry

I am tired of all the rhetoric, one-liners, and repeated speeches, over and over ad nauseum. Barack Obama tells everyone to “look” at his words when he answers questions and John McCain claims all Americans as “friends”. Obama’s running mate Joe Biden thinks everyone in the RNC is “out of touch” and spouts piffy sayings that his momma and/or daddy or some other relative "always said”. Oh! and the RNC’s poster girl, Governor Palin of Alaska, accents her speeches with “Now” - coupled with a wink or cheeky clicking sound - and then ends her sentences with “ya’ know?” (Okay, well, I jest some on that last part.) But SERIOUSLY folks!

Who here is with me on the point that all the buzzwords and canned speeches are just about enough to make you lose your lunch, for good?! I know I personally almost puked all over myself this weekend when I heard the same misleading one-liner statements coming from candidates that I had heard from different location speeches only a week ago (courtesy of POTUS 08 via XM satellite radio). Can we not just answer the questions of Americans’ concerns without all the broken record regurgitations and leave the recordings to the web and TV commercials folks, please?!

So, Americans are “angry” and there are a lot of issues on which the candidates differ “fundamentally”! I think that Joe the Plumber, Tito the Builder, Joe Six-Pack, all the hockey moms, and most importantly, you and I and every other average hard working low-, and middle-, and upper-class American are sick and tired of it all. We are FUNDAMENTALLY ANGRY that the people we elect to be our leaders abuse their positions, that politicians openly accept challenges to be transparent in their dealings but then make shady deals behind closed doors, and that our "representatives" just plain forget about the constituents they claim to advocate for (like ol' Mom and Pop and Mr. & Mrs. John and Jane Q. Public) once they get into political office. I have had enough!

We Americans all grimace as we pay for gas at the pump, clip our coupons before we go grocery shopping, worry about how to pay for our kids’ college, work toward our retirement at our seemingly dead-end jobs, and still find ways to make today’s ends meet somehow. We each put our pants on, one leg at a time, after we’ve washed, dried, folded, and ironed them (probably sometime during a “day-off” most likely, between all the soccer games, dish-washing, house cleaning, bill-paying, et cetera that we squeeze into what little time off we get).

So how is Ohio any more important a stomping ground than Hawaii? Are Floridian’s “fundamental” issues any different than those in Utah? I personally would like to see my own candidate from Arizona show up in my back yard once in a while, rallying for his political cause and the cause of every American, regardless of whether my home state is a so-called “swing state” or not. Shouldn't each candidate make every American’s state, city, cause, issue, problem, industry, etc. the “battleground” on which to wage a political war? Aren't ALL Americans' futures at stake here?!

So here’s my rant in the form of an open letter to all the politicians out there, regardless of their proclaimed party affiliation:

Dear "friends” in Washington and in political positions at home and around the States:

Look! I - a middle class, white-collar American woman and soccer mom - am “angry” at YOU now! You are all - each and every one of you - “out of touch” with Americans.! Oh, and I’ve got news for you too… I know that Joe the Plumber is not your buddy, Joe Six-pack and his beer-drinkin’ brood was not sent an invitation to your last crème de la crème white-tie soirée, and you don’t live anywhere near Main Street. So, please spare us your claims of advocacy! Don’t proclaim or profess your knowledge or understanding of what worries me, what "fundamental" issues I face, or what makes me angry unless you have actually shown me that you have talked to me or people just like me on a regular and continuing basis. Get away from your political party meetings, your advisor lunches, your committee talks, and your campaign fundraiser events and get down to our level to talk one-on-one to Main Street Americans and hear about the issues they face. Better yet, abandon one of your eight houses or open your suburban mansion to the least of us! Step down from your soapbox, forget the caterer, wash your hands, roll up your sleeves and peel some potatoes – it’s time to break bread with a family struggling to get food to the table and keep money in the bank.

I remember a poem which I was forced to memorize in public elementary school, and I’ll share the most poignant portion of it again with you today, lest you have not read it yourself (for Mr. Smith you are not!):

"Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Whether directed to immigrants as they admired Lady Liberty from the boats as they approached Ellis Island in the past or to the modern American standing in line at the polls, Emma Lazarus spoke well of the “New Colossus” our country had become to the world. Yet, while our leaders allegedly hold the lamp to enlighten us and lead us to the gates of prosperity and through the foggy political community toward the greater good, I cannot help but feel like Hercule Poirot on the Orient Express. I am constantly confused by all the double-talk and muck-raking, digging around for facts and clues, yet never seeming to find out the real answer to the problem at hand – i.e., who is best qualified and has the clearest proposed solutions to the problems that Americans face in today’s world.

Perhaps, in time, there will be no “aisle” in Congress but a round table with everyone “present”, except when actually back home, talking to and consorting with their constituents. Or maybe I’ll learn how to read between the lines of all the “eloquent rhetoric” and “get” what politicians are really proposing, rather than having to suffer listening to the pundits and analysts interpretations. Or perhaps not, and I’ll continue living my American dream, all the while hanging on that "pipe dream" that "politics as usual" will ever come to an end? I would just like to really see one thing – anything! – at most basic “fundamental” level, change.

So, in summary - Take off the barn boots, give your speech writers a vacation, and get some new material folks! And look here, my friends! I, for one - as an angry fundamentalist - am ready at last for happy hour and some discounted appetizers. And, as my drunken daddy used to always say, “Where’s my beer” … ya know?