The Other Side Of The Political Line

Nobody is entirely with the program. Even the most die-hard liberal or conservative has an issue or two where he disagrees with the platform. In fact, most of us are not to the extreme either way. And yet there is a line that runs between all of us, deciding which side we’re on.

You can agree with someone on 49% of issues and be on the opposite side of that line. You can disagree with someone on 49% of the issues and be on the same side that hates everyone on that other side of the line.

Think about it: libertarians see things very differently than the religious right does, but they’re both assigned a spot on the right end of the spectrum. Your typical Hillary Clinton supporter sees things very different from those who supported Bernie Sanders and yet the two are supposed to come together in the end to defeat whoever is chosen on the other side of the line that has been drawn. But the fact is the mainstream elements of both parties more closely align with each other on significant issues that both Libertarians and Greens oppose. When it comes to foreign intervention and marijuana legalization, the far ends of the political spectrum are in agreement against the middle.

The problem with choosing a side in politics is that you find yourself compelled to defend it. And since no side is perfect, since you yourself are unable to see all sides of an issue, you invariably end up defending the indefensible. When you do that, you give propaganda opportunities to your opponents, since they catch you saying what is simply not true. Also, it justifies (in their eyes) them doing the same, and a perpetual war is begun, all because of a line that has been drawn. All because we need to see an “us” and a “them”, but whatever line we draw is arbitrary.

No liberal or conservative identifies entirely along the party line. I know plenty of pro-union people who are also pro-gun. I know plenty of pro-life people who dislike guns. There is no “them”, there is only us. We are all different, and we all share a common humanity. We need to talk it out, not shout. We need to not be afraid of crossing that line, because it is merely illusory and arbitrary. We fight only because we love so deeply, not because we hate. What hate we end up feeling is merely love that is twisted. We must not stray from love, must not succumb to hate.

Let’s get back to percentages again. Many who vote on either side consider themselves perhaps 60% one way, and 40% the other. That means that a self-identifying liberal and a self-identifying conservative could potentially agree on 80% of issues and yet despise the other because of the label they choose to place upon themselves and others. Two self-identifying conservatives who agree with 60% of the platform, given different reasons for self-identifying conservative, could actually be in disagreement over 80% of the issues. Even someone who is 75% liberal will have a conservative counterpart somewhere who agrees with him on 50% or more of the issues.

But what’s even more concerning is that if the truth were to be known, the typical liberal and the typical conservative agree on many issues about which neither the Democratic nor Republican leadership care to discuss. Who among us believes gerrymandering is good for our democracy, especially since it leads to less competition for public offices? Because of gerrymandering, we have candidates who often run unopposed. And yet the justification for using it by one party is that the other one does it too.

Who amongst us believed it was a good idea to become embroiled in Syria until our political and media elite started to bang the drum for it? Or Libya, or Iraq, for that matter? And yet there are few who have been elected to federal positions willing to speak out against our involvement there.

How many of us thought it was a good idea to have private groups sponsoring international corporations write trade agreements, the details of which congressmen were not allowed to share with their constituents? And yet this was a bipartisan no-brainer until Donald Trump was willing to pick it up as an issue.

There are countless areas where agreement and discussion could lead to improvements in our nation. There is not a thing that partisan bickering will resolve. The bickering does serve a purpose, but not for the populace. The constant juvenile mudslinging serves to distract the citizens from the issues on which they agree and the monied interests do not. Unity of the masses is the single greatest threat a small minority who wishes to control a government can face. And so they back demagogues that do nothing but passionately speak their half-truths. They own the media which is socially liberal, economically conservative, and always pro-war. When they can’t prevent the truth from leaking out then they cover it with filth and dump it into a tub of lies. And because it is all so disgusting and we do not wish to crawl through it all to discover the truth, we find it convenient to blame the other side for all that is wrong with our country.

Our country will only have a government that is of the people, for the people and by the people when we are able to set aside our differences and not only work towards compromise but discover that what everyone wants is really not all that different no matter what side of the rather arbitrary line you are on. The alternative, the destructive combativeness we now witness, cannot be good for our country, though it may benefit the very few.

Things I'd Point Out To Gun Owners If I Wasn't Afraid Of Getting Shot

1.       In the 50's parents and the broader community raised the children. Now, children are raised by television, and television does not promote responsible gun use.

2.       I’ll take my chances with a mass shooter over armed teachers any day.

3.       I’m not against guns, I’m against bad reasoning and powerful lobbying groups. Okay, I’m afraid of guns too, but I respect that you feel the need to have one. I respect that it is part of the culture you grew up in. But the NRA is a group funded by gun manufacturers in order to increase sales. They’re like the sugar industry pushing their product on people who don’t really need it. They’re like an insurance agent pushing fear. They’re like the pharmaceutical lobby that’s looking to have everyone on drugs. The pharmaceutical industry. There’s one I’d like to see connected to mass shootings. How many of those people were on prescription meds?

4.       Don’t tell me more guns will lead to less gun violence. I’ve seen too many war movies to know that’s not true. Don’t tell me guns are part of a well-balanced breakfast or will make my teeth bright. Just tell me a gun makes you feel more secure, admit that a gun to you is like a woogie to a toddler. Admit that you want a gun because you feel afraid. And what are you afraid of? Unarmed people? No, you’re afraid of people with guns. Well so are the rest of us. Oh, I know, it’s the bad gun owners that are the problem, not the good guys. They’re there to protect us. Maybe if the good guys looked a little more like Pat Boone I’d feel less threatened. But it’s those Pat Boone looking types that are the ones to flip out in the end, aren’t they?

5.       If criminals can still murder without guns, why can’t good guys protect us without them?

6.       We both agree that it is not guns but nuts with guns that are the problem. Explain to me why you think the NRA isn't nuts.

7.       The answer to piranha attacks is more piranhas in the waters.

8.       The answer to drugs in schools is to give drugs to teachers.

9.       The problem is that sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between the good guy with a gun and the crazy guy with a gun. For example, which one is Ted Nugent supposed to be? If he’s one of the good guys with a gun, what do the crazy ones look like? Honestly, you know how it is when you see a Middle Easterner, right? You don’t know which are part of the overwhelmingly peaceful majority and which are the crazies. Well that’s how gun owners look to non-gun owners. If you walk into a grocery store with a gun, that looks threatening to us, just like someone who dresses differently or has a different accent appears threatening to you, the difference being that nobody was ever killed by a Keffiyeh.

10.   I respect your right to gun ownership, I really do. Now please start acting like you respect my right to not own a gun and not be shot. I know you feel that the answer to not being shot is to own a gun but not everyone feels the way you do. Some people just don’t feel the need. Respect that. Because when it comes to me looking out for myself I feel the same way you do, I care about myself and my ability to choose what is best for me than I do what is best for you and what you think is right. And that means when it comes to my right not to get shot I really don’t care about what the Constitution says, much less your interpretation of it. You see, the Declaration Of Independence precedes the Constitution and it says I have a right to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. My right to life is more important than your right to gun. It predates it by thousands of years. In The Bible, it was not only immoral to shoot someone, it was impossible. That is how God made us to be: gunless. Jesus told us that those who live by the sword would die by the sword. I think that applies to guns as well. Guns are contrary to God’s will, and it is time to beat them into plowshares.

11.   Even so, I do not begrudge you your guns even though I don’t use the things. After all, I have a few sins and vices of my own and I wouldn’t appreciate you trying to take away my right to drink a beer or two because you don’t imbibe. Of course, there are laws restricting my drinking and I understand that. I don’t take a beer into the grocery store with me, nor would I ever take one into a church or a library. Because I’m a responsible beer drinker just as you are a responsible gun owner.

12.   I watched Michael Moore’s Bowling for Columbine. That right there will have half of you totally dismissing anything I have to say, but hear me out for a moment. I didn’t think it was a great film, felt that in the end it really didn’t have an answer to the problems of gun violence. But perhaps that was a strength to it, not having easy answers. In one part of the movie he asks why Canada and the U.S. seem comparable in gun laws and ownership and yet the U.S has so much more gun violence. Here is one possible explanation: the NRA and the influence of money on politics. Show me an issue where money is spent and I will show you irrational, extremist views being voiced.

13.   I know tons of normal people with guns. But Ted Nugent? That would be like NORML getting Ozzie Osbourne to support their cause.

14.   The Second Amendment clearly states that every property-owning white male has the right to own a flintlock pistol or a muzzle loading musket.

15.   You don’t need a gun to not get shot, but You do need a gun to shoot someone else.

16.   Why didn’t our founding fathers insist on my right not to get shot? Maybe it was just part of the Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness thing. Maybe it was just assumed that my right not to get shot was important.

17.   It’s not that I’m more afraid of gun owners than my government, it’s just that I have more faith in my government to protect me from being shot than I trust gun owners to protect my other freedoms. Whatever government that would be formed by militias would be a nightmare, far worse than what we have now. The government worth having will not come through force but through non-violent and intelligent means.

18.   When you take up arms to oppose a tyrannical government, the government will send in robots with bombs to blow your ass up. They will send drones to take you out. Your guns will not protect you from the government, they will only serve to divide the public between gun owners and non-gun owners.

19.   You frighten us non-gun owners. I know you are absolutely right when you say that people kill people, not guns. But very often people who kill people do so with guns. I know people can kill people with knives too, and people openly carrying machetes scare me as well.

20.   I have just one question: how come all the shooting range targets are black?

21.   I do not fear being murdered by a gun owner. The odds are pretty slim. What I fear is being pummeled to death by the faulty arguments of the NRA.

22.   The pro-gun position will always have an advantage because guns are a product, and there is money to be made by promoting them. The anti-gun side will have no big money behind them, hence no big P.R. firms manipulating public opinion on their behalf. Ban the AR-15? Perish the thought when profits are at stake. I’m not saying they should be banned, I’m just saying the pro-gun lobby will never be as even-handed as I am. I don’t have a profit motive, they do. And they have the finances to spread their message far further than I can.

Germany And The Rise Of Hitler

Comparisons have been made of late between contemporary United States and the rise of Nazi Germany. As I am currently studying that era, I figured I would share remembrances from those who were actually there. I’m not trying to make a value judgment, just passing along quotes that somehow seem applicable to the times. All quotes are taken from How Democracy Failed, published in 1975, so no comparisons are attempted from the book’s author to today’s events.

“People knew that there was a sort of Hitler underground, that kids were being indoctrinated, that democratic teachers were getting fired, that the Nazis were better organized than the newspapers ever told us. And there was a quality of political anger.”

“Of course, hate didn’t really explode suddenly in 1930. Hate for Jews, for ‘traitors”, for the liberal press (which as the bearer of bad news was often regarded as the cause of all the disasters), and for politicians who seemed to promise a better life but couldn’t deliver even a few more jobs, had been smoldering in Germany ever since the end of World War I.”

“Students graduated from college into a world that had no place for them. After working hard to get into the university and then spending many years cramming for tough, ever-recurring competitive examinations, many of these students felt betrayed by their country, as did the thousands of shopkeepers whose businesses failed.”

“By reinforcing all the prejudices of the men whom life had apparently failed, telling them that their inability to find work, to lead a decent life, to support their families, was a planned plot by their old enemies, the liberals, the Jews and the scheming politicians, the Nazi party added thousands of new, fighting mad members to its ranks every month.”

“Few realized that the whole world, America included, was going through a depression. They thought that their country had been singled out for misery by “those foreigners”, who were, of course, becoming rich through Germany’s poverty.

On reading over German papers for the months of June, July, and August, it becomes obvious that the vast majority of political reporters, columnists and editors still considered Hitler and his band of conspicuous followers a very minor menace. There were about thirty daily papers in Berlin, and only those that were specifically oriented toward the Nazi party predicted any significant gains in Hitler’s parliamentary delegation.

Hitler attempted to be all things to all men. To a group of students he could appear as a moderate, rather mild politician. In public he preferred to be seen as a gentle man, who loved children and cared so much for animals that he became a vegetarian. His speeches were often so irrational that politicians flatly refused to take him seriously.

By 1933—still appearing to an objective observer to be an irrational, spiteful, rather unintelligent and uneducated little man—he had become one of the most powerful rulers in history. A lost war, a disastrous inflation, disorder and crime, and many lost German illusions had helped to put him in power. But so had some other rather special German problems: an educational system that emphasized obedience over independent thought; a series of orators who taught the public to distrust a free press; an overwhelming longing for order and stability, even at the expense of freedom and justice.

There were those who had always believed that freedom leads to license, that patriotism means an uncritical attitude toward the state, and finally, that the leadership of that state should not be subjected to public scrutiny.

Usually, the distrust produced indifference. Most Germans simply didn’t want to become involved. They considered all politicians as corrupt or corruptible, newspapers as biased, political speeches as empty promises…

Hilda, of course, didn’t understand that Hitler, himself, was well aware of the drama that the fights created, and that they got for him much needed free space in the press. Hitler was also aware of the distrust of politics and government by most Germans, like Hilda’s parents…

He (Hitler) had come to the simple conclusion that a speech would be remembered more vividly if accompanied by violence. He therefore welcomed violent interruptions, because they gave his bodyguards an excuse to wade through the crowd and engage in savage fighting.”

If the average German was disgusted with the fighting and chaos, Hitler was getting his name in the papers, and his followers were proud of him.

Early in his career, Hitler had learned that his audiences were not interested in closely reasoned ideas. What they liked was pounding repetition : the same attacks against the liberals, the Jews, the press and the pacifists, using the same frightening and passionate phrases, with the same promises of a great and bright future.

“One man, who looked like a student, asked at the meeting I attended why the Communists and the international bankers were working together,” a man who is now a banker reported. “That seemed like a fairly intelligent question to me, but one of Hitler’s guards just walked up to him and hit him in the mouth.”

Pardon Me, I Trumped

Many of us in The United States are making a face of disgust in response to the emergence of Trump. There are tears in the eyes of many, looks of revulsion and nausea. We question how it happened, how anything could have resulted in something so God-awful.

But the fact is, it was only a matter of time before it happened. As malodorous as it was, we needed to get this thing out of our system. We’ve been attempting to keep it in for too long and it was causing us immense amounts of discomfort. We could feel the roiling in our bowels, the impending emergence of something most foul, but we tried to wish it away. And when the ugliness came out we were mortified, sickened. The world held its breath as it slowly dawned on them what we had done.

America farted. The left cheek, with its single, pronounced boil, and the right cheek, a veritable constellation of festering pimples, squeezed together and let a Trump out. Nobody saw it coming, no one expected something like this. Such a thing simply is not done on such a solemn occasion as a presidential election. People should be pulling the voter lever and not their own finger when behind the voting booth curtain. It’s just not good manners to do such a thing. But sometimes you just can’t help yourself. Sometimes you only mean to let a silent one out, hoping it won’t stink up the place.

But this was a bad one. The signs were there, voters were already admitting they would be holding their noses as they voted, more so than in any election in recent memory.

What we squeezed out was more distasteful than anything we could have imagined. It brought tears to the eyes of those who were easily offended, while the baser among us were able to make crude jokes about it.

And then there were those who just don’t care where they do such a thing. To them it was a tremendous accomplishment. It was they alone who were capable of savoring the moment, they alone who were not offended by the noxious little thing they had given birth to. I’ve never understood how people could do such a thing to others and find humor in it, but it’s undeniable that they exist in every corner of the globe. To them, offending others is worth the stain they leave on their own underwear.

But as I said before, the outcome was entirely predictable. It’s an inevitable result of a bad diet. The body politic is simply incapable of digesting continuous servings of red meat the demagogues heap on to the plates of those who listen to talk radio. That’s what you get when the food you consume is utterly lacking in the roughage of critical thought. We have been gorging ourselves with food that is little more than sugar and fat, entertainment designed to appeal to our taste buds without providing us anything of substance.

Let this be a warning to all of us. This is what happens when you don’t bother to look into where your foodstuffs come from, this is what happens when you look away while the sausage is getting made. We, all of us, have to start paying a whole lot more attention to what we ingest. Because a simple fart, not matter how disgusting and off-putting it may be, is the least of our worries. The digestive tract can become quite sensitive once it has been sufficiently abused. If I lacked the refinement of he who is to become our next president, I would describe the symptoms for you, but I’m sure your imagination can fill in the details.

Capitulation Is Not An Effective Strategy

Before Donald Trump was elected President of the United States, people were wondering what would happen if he lost the election and refused to concede. Of course, nobody thought to ask the same question about Hillary Clinton because we all knew the answer: she would quit the fight even if she had the majority of the votes, just as Al Gore did in 2,000. Funny in those 16 years between Gore and Clinton nobody on the Democratic side of things did anything to ensure that voters’ rights were guaranteed, did nothing to appeal to their left flank, and did nothing to get rid of the electoral college that has now cost them 12 years of Republican presidents in 20 years.

Let me point out for you some of the differences between the Republicans and Democrats:

--Democrats lost in 2,000 and are still blaming Ralph Nader. Republicans lost in 1992 and still quote Ross Perot. No animosity there, despite the fact his presence enabled Bill Clinton to be elected.

--Election after election the Democrats insist the better candidate is unelectable and go with the establishment option. Republicans nominated Donald Trump.

--Democrats say NAFTA was a done deal by the time Bill Clinton got into office and he had no choice but to enact it into law. Republicans promised to put an end to Obamacare their first day in office, even though it’s already been the law for years now.

See, the difference between Democrats and Republicans is that when Democrats lose an election they look into moving to Canada and when Republicans lose elections they buy guns. In short, Republicans bravely attack while the Democrats are a bunch of…well, let’s just say Trump wouldn’t be shy about grabbing them.

The difference is as obvious as the difference between Sean Hannity and Alan Colmes. Of course it’s set up on Fox News to allow Hannity to be the tough guy, but I suspect it’s similar with the party candidates. I truly believe the game is rigged to support strong Republicans and weak Democrats. Even when we get a winning candidate he ends up moving the country to the right. Barack Obama entered office with a Democratic congress and did nothing more than bail out the big banks. He turned Bush’s two wars into four. The healthcare plan he managed to get passed was modeled off his Republican opponent’s plan.

Yes, Hillary Clinton lost, and the result is something that appears very much like fascism. But the answer to that threat was never going to be another Clinton. Donald Trump is the bloom upon the plant the Clintons have been diligently watering for the last 24 years. Had it not been for NAFTA and TPP Trump would not have had trade as a weapon to use against her. Had not Clinton in her role as Secretary of State overthrown the government of Libya and stirred the pot in Syria, had she bravely refused to vote against the war in Iraq, Trump would not now have the anti-immigrant cudgel he now wields.

If it was fascism we were facing in the 2016 election, then Hillary Clinton was Neville Chamberlain. No, worse than that, she was the Maginot Line. Even worse yet, she was Vichy France. She was a facile attempt to deal with very real issues by not dealing with them. She was a coat of paint on a crumbling bit of infrastructure. She was a wolf who took the time to dress herself in a sheep’s pantsuit.

Let me give you an example of how a tepid candidate not only loses you elections but doesn’t allow you to pass your agenda should you happen to win. The climate is changing. The freaking climate is changing and it’s our fault. The climate is changing, it’s our fault, and only people who deny the preponderance of scientific evidence will claim otherwise. It will require immediate action to ameliorate the effects and nobody knows for certain how bad it will be even if we turn the boat around this instant. This is actually happening. Something’s actually happening, Reg, and we have to do something!

Hillary Clinton had this issue to work with against a science-denying half-wit and because she was in the pockets of the oil industry she made no mention of it save when on the same stage as Bernie Sanders and could not avoid it. She had in her possession the flaming sword of God’s own justice and she never bothered to unsheathe it, let alone use it to cut the head off the ogre. We are actively destroying God’s greatest gift to us—the planet—and Hillary Clinton could not bring herself to make it a campaign issue.

You cannot be timid about such issues as climate change. If it is real it is terrifying and if you don’t act like it is terrifying, people will assume it is not real. It only feeds into the mindset of those brainwashed by the rightwing media that tells them global warming is a hoax. They have been told in confident tones that Global Warming is not real, it must be countered with an even firmer response if they are ever to be swayed. The truth of it must be shoved in their faces, not whispered timidly only when in the right group of people.

Hillary’s career has been one of capitulation. She is the example of everything Trump supporters don’t like. She is the reason people were willing to believe in Trump if only because he did not sound like a politician. They wanted to hear conviction, wanted to see it, and it showed more in Trump than it did in Clinton. It was a naïve choice on their part, but you must remember they had no other option than the status quo that had shipped their jobs overseas and bailed out big banks while leaving them with more mortgage debt than house equity.

To be a leader you must be bold. Clinton had at her disposal a youthful and zealous army but she refused to rally them to her side. Nobody rallies to a flag with the emblem of a weasel or a snake but instead to one with an eagle or a lion. How did you expect that we would follow you? Who is willing to go into battle unless they believe the cause is just and the generals trustworthy?

You had the arrows of truth in your possession but you could not shoot straight. You had the scars of countless campaigns but they were undermined by the myriad whispered rumors of you secretly being in the camp of the enemy. We simply could not trust one who had been rewarded so handsomely without ever actually winning any battles.

You played it safe all your life in order to win the ultimate prize and in the end you lost. You retreated whenever the battle was upon you, as you did upon the eve of the Iraq war. You betrayed those truest to the cause and most willing to fight for it and instead sought to enlist officers from the enemy’s camp: Glen Beck, John Negroponte, Brent Scowcroft, John Warner. Politics is as much about emotions as it is intellect, but you appealed strongly to neither.

The people were frightened, they were frightened by a world you helped shape. Many who voted for Donald Trump couldn’t precisely put their finger on what was wrong but their senses told them, quite correctly, that there was something rotten in our political system. They voted for hope and change, just as many voted for hope and change when they went to the polls for Barack Obama in 2008. I’m guessing a fair amount of people voted for Trump as they once did for Obama, placing their hopes irrationally on slogans and aspirations rather than thoughtful proposals and a proven track record.

It is not the rank and file who can be found wanting, not us who should be judged. It is our leaders who have failed us. 50% of us did not march to battle at all, most of the rest did so grudgingly. Should a true leader someday emerge, he will find himself with a nation of eager followers, ready to take on whatever tasks are asked of us. When someone comes along who can unite us, not divide us, we will once again show what the United States is capable of. We can yet be an example to the world, a city upon a hill that demonstrates liberty and justice. Until that time, I suggest that it is best to avoid going to war for generals who are interested in nothing more than enriching their own coffers and their own sense of glory. Do not take up arms against those who they claim is your enemy. The hatred and the violence will only worsen your lot while feeding the egos of those who seek victory, heedless of the cost.

Guns For Libs

When liberals lose an election, they look into moving to Canada. Well sometimes they whine and block traffic, too, but that’s beside the point. When conservatives lose elections, they buy guns. I’m not going to say what that makes you liberals look like, let’s just say that Trump would like to grab you.

Like Trump, most conservatives don’t have much respect for people without guns. Actually, Trump has no respect for anyone, but that’s a different matter. What matters is that it’s time for lefties to change their tactics.

Which is why it’s time Liberals should start buying guns. They should buy so many guns that they drive the price of those suckers up. They should buy so many guns that conservatives have to pay twice as much for guns. Hell, they should buy so many guns that the conservatives start thinking about selling the guns they have in order to profit off a buyer’s market. Liberals should buy so many guns that the military has to buy their guns from China.

Think of how many guns Barbara Streisand could buy if she put her mind to it. Liberals could have a big concert and give the proceeds to liberals who can’t afford to buy guns. They could give hand guns out to the gunless, the way they give out condoms in high school.

It's time to temporarily take all those books out of the little free library you liberals have in your front yard and stock them full of guns instead. This could be our little liberal secret, a place for liberals in need to access a gun should the occasion arise. And don't worry, neither conservatives nor criminals would ever think to look in one. Just make sure it's high enough off the ground that the kids can't get to it.

How about guns to the homeless? After all, give a man a fish and he will eat for a day, give him a gun and sufficient quantities of ammo, and he’s well on his way to self-sufficiency.

Think about this, as well: the more guns liberals buy, the less money the NRA is going to want spend to back the Republican Party exclusively. Democratic candidates could start out-gun-righting the right, so that all those NRA dollars will start pouring into the secret PACs that attack Republican candidates.

It wouldn’t be hard to do. There are already a ton of people who vote Democrat who own guns. Most of them just don’t fall for the line of the NRA that the Democrats want to take their guns. Hell, most libs aren’t really as scared of guns as they are the people who buy them. If you’ve owned a Samsung tablet a gun is no more of a danger.

The Democrats could use Trayvon Martin as their poster child: “He’d still be alive if he had been carrying a gun instead of Skittles.” Maybe they could do one of those gun trade-ins in the inner city, only in reverse, so instead of you turning in your gun and getting cash for it, maybe they could trade a bag of Skittles for a gun.

How many conservatives would be standing outside a black polling place to see if voters had proper ID if they knew everyone voting was packing more than just a driver’s license? How many voter’s rights would be denied if those doing the denying were aware of the suddenly lax gun laws?

It’s simple, you just have to out-crazy the crazies. That’s what the conservatives have been doing all along: no matter what the liberals were willing to go along with, just ask for more. The liberals just have to turn it into a game of chicken and refuse to lose no matter where the conservatives are willing to take it. Guns for 12 year olds? What’s wrong with 10 year olds? What’s wrong with guns for convicted felons, they’ve done their time, right? This is America, after all. Why have laws about guns at all? Isn’t the 2nd Amendment crystal clear on this? What is there to argue about “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed?”

The simple fact is the Right is never going to respect you until you have guns. Until you do they will think you are sissies unworthy of citizenship. They are sick and tired of having to protect you on a regular basis from all those things that need to be opposed with guns. It’s time to grow a pair, liberals. It’s time to start carrying your own weight and get yourself a gun, so that you can protect yourself rather than being a drain on society. And who knows, if you get good with guns, maybe you can start returning the favor. Maybe you can start protecting conservatives from danger the way they’ve been protecting liberals all this time. Instead of a George Zimmerman patrolling the streets and keeping them safe, maybe we could have an Antwayn and DeAndre packing a pistol and standing at the corner of your street. If that doesn’t make you feel safer I question your true commitment to gun rights.

I’ve noticed that conservatives tend to bond over their guns. They just tend to trust other gun owners, feeling that those who don’t own guns are a little bit strange and untrustworthy. Perhaps if universal gun ownership were to become a reality, the differences between races and religions might not seem so extreme. Maybe all we really need for peace to reign is to make sure every African American and Muslim is carrying his own gun, every tree-hugging vegan hippie packing heat. That way you wouldn’t have to brand the bad ones, you’d just recognize them by their suspicious lack of any firearm. I’d like to think that such a world would be one in which all could join hands as brothers, but of course such a show of solidarity might leave us all a little slow on the draw.

The Abuser Has Two Faces

I am not going to tell you who you should vote for, since I have no idea what issues are most important to you. I will, however, suggest how you should vote. You should vote with an attitude of love and hope, just as you should do all things with an attitude of love and hope. For love and hope grow stronger and spreads to others the more we practice it, just as fear and hatred tends to spread like some contagious disease.

If you vote with hate and fear as your motivations, you will create a system that furthers hate and fear, it really is that simple. If you believe that you cannot support either of the major party candidates in a spirit of love and hopefulness, then walk away from the system because the system does not offer the solutions you or society needs. When we can no longer bring the better angels of our nature into the voting booth with us, it is the system that is broken. And when the system is broken, working within the parameters of that system is supporting that system. To support either of the two-party candidates is to support the two-party system. That is what we’ve been doing for generations now and it has led us to where we are now. There is no logical reason to assume it will be different this time, that voting for the lesser of two evils will bring about the change we really need. It will at best delay the inevitable, permitting all that is wrong to become further entrenched.

Of course, if you are comfortable with the situation as it is, then there is no problem. If you believe that the vote you cast will make for a better tomorrow, by all means do so. But if you vote in fear of what will happen should you not do as you are told by those who know better than you, then you are not behaving as an autonomous adult in touch with your human potential and ability. You are alienated from what makes you a truly independent and powerful human being. You are, in fact, behaving like an abuse victim.

It is a trap nobody expects to fall into. One day you suddenly realize you are reacting in fear all of the time. You feel helpless and you feel stupid and you feel like a bad person no matter what you do. You find yourself timidly acquiescing in hopes of receiving the lesser punishment, hope to deal with the less threatening face of the abuser, but his abusive behavior will continue as long as you continue to play the abuser’s game. If you ever want to break out of that prison, that box that has Democrats as the left wall, Republicans as the right wall, a front wall that has the corporate media as your window to the world, and the ever present wall of fear at your back, you will have to refuse the parameters that have been set for you. You cannot permit yourself to give into the fear and the hatred. You have to have faith that there is something better and transcend the walls that have you imprisoned. You must trust in others and in yourself.

We have lost faith in our fellow humans and in ourselves, handing over that faith instead to institutions and figures of authority. To abusers. We see all too clearly our shortcomings and do not permit ourselves to see what we as individuals and a society are capable of. We give our inalienable rights away to abusers who promise to make things better and always end up making things worse. Why else would we vote the way we do except that we let ourselves see the worst in others and in ourselves? We fear true democracy, afraid that we will have to make real decisions. Why else would we tolerate the political advertising that pollutes our airwaves and our souls and allow ourselves to believe there is no better way? There is a better way but it is up to us to find it.

That’s the way abusers work, by getting us to stop seeing any beauty or goodness in life. For them it is about keeping you in a constant state of fear and uncertainty. But if you are ever going to make things better, you will have to walk away from the games, the threats, the controlling behavior. You must first see yourself as more than helpless if you wish to be something more than a mere extension of the abuser.

An abuser has two faces. A victim of abuse always tries to curry favor with the more peaceful side of the abuser so that he or she doesn’t have to face the violent side. Donald Trump is the ugly, violent side of the abuser. Hillary Clinton is the side that says: “I’m sorry I hit you, baby, it won’t happen again. I love you. I know I voted for that war in Iraq and I was for all those trade agreements that took your job, but I changed.” Of course the implied threat is that if you don’t deal with the Hillary side of things, the Trump side is going to bang your head against the wall.

It takes courage to leave an abuser, courage and a plan. For too long you have convinced yourself that if you just go along with him you can make him change. You constantly compromise what you feel is right so that you don’t displease him. Then the violence occurs, followed by the apologies and the promise that it will never happen again.

But he won’t change, he will never change. The abuser has you in his power and power is the one thing he loves more than anything. He will never really love you, he will merely seek to control and possess you. This is a sad reality that most victims of abuse are slow to realize because they cannot imagine anyone is actually capable of thinking this way. But this I promise, he will never change and it is up to you to get out from under him.

In the meantime he will cut you off from everyone who tries to tell you he’s no good for you. He will cut you off from your family and friends, anyone who is not within his thrall. He will make you feel utterly helpless and at the same time blame you for everything that goes wrong. “I lost because you didn’t support me enough. You didn’t believe in me. I wanted to pass a health-care bill that would cover everyone but everyone is out to get me.”

The abuser wants to make you feel ignorant, that he has all the answers and you better not try to question him. He will tell you the most absurd lies imaginable, and he will demand that you believe him. He wants to make you feel helpless to do anything on your own to make things better. He wants you to believe that you are worthless without him and that you are lucky to have him.

The abuser wants you to see one of his two faces as the real one. He wants you to think that if you love him enough that the other, uglier face, will just go away. But it has kept getting uglier, hasn’t it? The violence more intense and often. Some day you’re going to have to realize exactly who it is your dealing with. It’s time to start working on your courage and your exit strategy, because he is never going to change. It’s time to reach out to all of those who he said was bad for you, time to start making connections with the outside world again. They may be Republicans or Democrats, but they’re abuse victims just like you. And we all need to be strong and support each other if we’re going to ever be free.

I might not have all the answers—I suspect nobody is that smart—but I know the kind of fertile soil from which a healthy society grows, and it is rich in love and hope. Nothing good will come of hatred and fear. If that is all you have within you, stay away from a polling station. No, that is not good enough. That is the abuser in me talking. Instead, find the love and hope that is in you and find a way to make a positive difference. You’ve been inside the box too long.