politics
A quick rundown
Nov 3rd
Halloween was awesome, visiting friends and Ryan’s family was great. Pictures will come soon. But just in case I don’t get back here, I want to remind everyone to VOTE tomorrow. Whoever you are supporting, make sure you get educated on the choices you have and make your voice heard!
I’ll be going before work tomorrow to try to avoid the super-huge lines I’m sure will be there after work. Plus, our polling place is only 2 blocks away. I can walk! ;-) Let’s all do our part to make sure that we have a say tomorrow. And if you can help someone else have their say by maybe giving them a ride to the polls, or watching their kids while they go vote you should do that too (although it would be a pretty cool experience for older children to see their parents vote).
I don’t know how widespread this will be – especially after a law was passed restricting it after the 2004 election, but if you see something going on at the polls that doesn’t seem right – people being intimidated, lied to, whatever, you can call 1-866-OUR-VOTE to report it and get advice. But I heard on MPR this morning that after the 2004 election, Minnesota passed some rules about challenging – mostly, you can’t bring in people from out of state to challenge a person’s right to vote, and the challenger has to have “personal knowledge” that the person they are challenging isn’t elligible. So hopefully it won’t be a big issue here. But for those of you in other states – be on the lookout. No one should feel intimidated into not voting if they are elligible.
It’s not always just black and white.
Oct 20th
First of all, I want to apologize to the commenters whose comments have been sitting in the “waiting for approval” box on our blog. It’s supposed to forward the reminder emails to me, but it didn’t. And as you can tell, I haven’t written in a while. So I’m really sorry! I love you! Come back sometime! ;-)
On to more serious matters.
I don’t really know how to write this entry. Mostly because it is such a deeply personal issue for so many people, but also because there are some people in my life that I’m afraid that I will offend. But I still feel like I need to say this, because it is important to me.
I’m not “pro-choice” per se. But I think that identity was developed using what the conservative right has defined being pro-choice as. Believing that it meant you were for abortion, without reservation. And I am not. I’ve identified myself as “pro-life” since I can remember, although I try to always make the distinction that I’m not “pro-life” like some people are, who are really anti-abortion but don’t appear to care about all the other ways life is abused in our nation and in our world. The wider pro-life view is a big part of why I will be voting for Obama this year. But that is my choice, and I know other people need to make their choices based on their personal research and priorities.
Where am I going with this?? I don’t really know, other than my point was to direct you all to a few entries that I think anyone who thinks the abortion issue is black and white should read. These are real stories by real women. And I have to agree with one of them in particular, who said in reference to McCain’s air quotes when talking about the health of the mother and late term abortions, ”I don’t see any way a thinking person can look at those air quotes and see anything but pandering, contempt, and a dangerous willful ignorance.” (For those who didn’t watch: he put air quotes around “health” and said that the pro-abortion ((sidenote – is ANYONE really pro-abortion???)) movement has stretched the term “health” so that women could get abortions basically whenever they wanted.)
Before you comment, please read the entries. And if you still think the issue is black and white, well then I guess we’ll just have to disagree. And that’s fine. I just wanted you to think about it.
Uppercase Woman - On National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Rememberance Day and her personal story
Uppercase Woman – On John McCain
Thank you for your time. And if you have nothing productive to say, save it and say a prayer for my soul instead.
Not as bad as I had expected, but still not good.
Oct 3rd
First – I know I am a total slacker and haven’t posted a link to photos from Oktoberfest yet. Because I fail (and I don’t use my desktop computer, where the pictures are, very often these days). I will get to it, I promise!
Now, on to the real entry:
Ryan and I watched the debate last night. I wanted to see how both candidates did. Biden has a reputation for going on so long that he gets himself in trouble, and Palin…well her recent interviews speak for themselves (I watched the full interviews on the TV’s websites-not just the worst clips floating around the internets). And the debate went much better than I expected. But the fact that Palin avoided answering so many of the questions and basically refused to come to the defense of McCain’s health care plan (which I can’t even begin to list the negative aspects of – seriously) or anything else was extremely disappointing. She kept returning to the few things she’s comfortable discussing. And that kind of defeats the purpose of the debate. But people were so impressed because she didn’t make a complete fool of herself. What does that say about her qualifications? Really?
There are a lot of blogs out there commenting on the debate, and so I’ll leave it at that. I find all of this interesting, and I was honestly happy that neither candidate came out looking like a complete fool. That being said, Sarah Palin, as likeable as she may seem to many people out there, is totally unqualified to be Vice President. And I didn’t see any evidence to the contrary last night.
