Politics are in season

As much as the candidates on both sides of the line have spoken about changing politics and reforming Washington, this is turning into the most divisive, polarizing campaign in quite some time. Granted, this will only be the fourth time I've been able to vote in a presidential election, but the "water-cooler" talk allows for no middle ground.

It should come as no surprise to anyone who knows me that I'm an Obama supporter. I can't envision a time in the foreseeable future where I would vote republican. But I also would not call myself a democrat because there are many things in the democratic party that I disagree with (but there are few things in the republican party with which I agree). This time, though, I'm inspired by the democratic candidate. I'm voting *for* someone, not against the republican. I'm encourage by the promise of a new kind of politics, by a person who thinks before he speaks, by someone who believes in diplomacy, by someone who voted AGAINST the war!

We desperately need this as a country, both because of the policies Obama wants to enact, but maybe more importantly, because it's time for a large population of people, who have been disenfranchised since the birth of our nation, to have a voice. The time of the old, white politician will not end, but the time of the non-white politician will be born. When all groups are represented, only then will the needs of our country as a whole be addressed.

And yet, as I watched the RNC last night I was profoundly disturbed. Not because of the personal attacks launched by the speakers. This is a form of campaigning that has been successful in recent decades, so why quit now? I was disturbed because people buy it. Because people laughed and jeered when the fact was brought up that Obama was a community organizer. When did this become something negative? Obama spent years of his life helping those less fortunate try to get back on their feet, to empower them to help themselves, and an entire convention of people LAUGHS? What does that say about us as a people?

I sat on my couch, watching the TV, feeling utterly and totally helpless and defeated. We do not have to agree on the policies it will take to get to a better America. In all likelihood, neither party is completely right about anything. But, are we so far gone that we can't agree that there is a lot of common ground on where we want to go? And if so, is name calling and jeering going to get us there?

Lest we forget that less than 250 years ago, most of our ancestors were foreigners, coming to this country to make something for themselves. Many of them were given land or purchased it through land grants, making it accessible to those who came here with virtually nothing. This is a country of immigrants, a country that was founded on the ideals that anyone can make it if they work hard.

When it becomes acceptable to laugh at those trying to help their fellow man, how can we possibly dig ourselves out? I'm concerned that we have landed in a place that is so far removed from what our founding fathers envisioned that it's too late to go back. Of course it is natural to evolve as a country. We should. The global economy, the pressures we face as a nation, could not have in any way been anticipated centuries ago. But the vision of our Democratic country that is championed as a mainstay of our identity as Americans by conservatives and democrats alike, has become nothing more than rhetoric.