ugh. . .my own facebook response
I've been very careful with responding to all of the political messages appearing on Facebook this election cycle, partially because I'm too busy to form an effective argument and try to maintain good relationships with people who have been in my life over the years. However, one friend posted that she was still on the fence about the election next week, and asked her "friends" to post a couple of reasons why she should vote for either Romney or Obama.
As is typical with the Republican campaign this year, the campaign isn't for Romney, it is mostly about getting Obama out of the White House - a sort of copycat replay of how they viewed the campaign against Bush and the GOP during his second term in office. Republicans aren't terribly original, but they have a ready audience of people who seem to thrive on finding someone else to blame for their conditions - the gays, the immigrants, the Democrats, the women, etc.
Well, true to form, her first responses were from people who had a long laundry list of mythical "facts" about Obama's responsibility for the economy and the gridlock in Washington "because he doesn't know how to work with the other party." One of them said that people over 70, because of Obamacare, would not get needed surgeries because there are limitations for them to live long afterwards (a variation of the GOP 'death panel' crap). Another went on about Romney's glorious business record, his sterling record of working with the other party in Massachusetts, and how we desperately need help with the economy.
After reading that, I broke my own rule and posted this in comments - a very long comment for me and certainly not covering everything. And before reading this, understand that I haven't been too happy with Obama's first term as well - but I also understand what he was up against (I'm a single payer fan, dammit - if I have to spend my tax dollars maintaining military bases in foreign countries who can use their money to provide health care to THEIR people, then I damned well think we can afford to provide it for our own! - ok - minor rant there. . haha).
So anyway, here was my comment, which I'm sure will get attacked by the many uninformed voters out there:
Our economy was in desperate need of help during the Bush Administration when we gave out tax cuts while running up huge credit debts to fight two wars. And it is still in need of help. During the congressional elections of 2010, the GOP campaigned on "jobs, jobs, jobs and the economy" yet once elected, sent more bills to repeal Obamacare to a Senate who they knew would never pass them. As unhappy as I am about Obama's presidency, I don't place all of the blame on the White House, particularly when the GOP's publicly stated goal was to limit him to one term in office, NOT serve the American people and in doing so, set a record number of filibusters in the Senate. Sending someone else into office without turning out the ones in Congress with that attitude is just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Moreover, just because Mitt Romney claims to have worked with a bipartisan legislature doesn't mean he actually did work with them. In fact, one report claims he delighted in vetoes during his own one term in office, and it doesn't appear the people of Massachusetts are too keen on him becoming President. He apparently used his veto over 800 times and had 775 overrides from the state house of representatives alone - gridlock of another kind - and he reportedly often lost support from his own party in that process. I haven't seen a single issue in which he has taken a consistent position, sometimes flipflopping on a daily basis, and I'm leery of voting for someone who can't maintain any real positions on anything. Am I pleased with Obama? No. But I'm not interested in having the country run as a corporation - by the corporations and for the corporations by a "business leader" who appears to prefer ruling by decree and changes his mind as often as his magic underwear.
Now be nice.
= new reply since forum marked as read
