"Common People" - PULP
Just sitting here musing on this and that and thinking about the upcoming election and what it really means to America. At least this is how I view things. America's middle class has been shrinking and that is not good, you see the middle class - common people are the backbone of this country and without a strong backbone the country will collapse.
In the past several years we have watched the rich Wall Street types run amok, un-tethered and un-punished for their misdeeds and yes for their greed. And now the Republican candidate for president rubs our nose in it by telling us that corporations are people too. And the really funny thing is that the United States Supreme Court agrees. Remember that ruling they made that overturned a Montana law that prohibited corporate spending in that state's election? A Citizen United deja vu moment all over again, the court reaffirming that corporations are people - at least as far as the First Amendment is concerned.
Hmm, maybe people but not human beings, right? Isn't it the human quality that we cherish, that warm, feeling, alive person that bleeds when cut, cries when hurt and reaches out a hand to help someone who has fallen.
And it really does frighten me to think that a person with Romney's beliefs might end up president of these United States. Because he doesn't really see the hurting people in this poor economy, he sees a different people, the corporations that need more tax breaks to survive and he sees those really rich people that run those corporations as needy as well.
Larry Womack wrote a really good article last August that appeared on The Huffington Post blog, you can read it here. In that article he wrote something I want to quote here because it is exactly how I feel on this subject:
"Real poverty is not knowing where your children's next meal is coming from. It's not being able to put shoes on their feet or take them to the doctor. It's living in constant fear of losing your job or getting sick. It's not having a car to take you to that job. It's wondering if you'll still have a hometwo months from now. It's hunger. It's cold. And, above all, it is fear. "
We have a lot of work cut out for us in this nation and turning our backs on the poor, the uneducated and the sick is not the place to start. I want a person at the helm who has at least some idea of what it is like to be one of "you people", who had to work hard to get to the top and knows that it can be done and knows that there are people who need help, hand-ups not hand-outs.
I will vote for President Obama this November, because between the two men he is the clear choice for me and what I believe. Because I want the weakest among us to be strong and if help is needed to achieve that goal that's OK with me. Because a healthier people, an educated people and a less-poor people does nothing but make this nation stronger.
