Mourning the future

Since the election, I've been in mourning.

I've mourned for the death of hope.

I've mourned the slow death of our democracy at the hands of corporate interests.

I've mourned for the death of reason and facts beneath the benevolent boot of evangelical fervor.

But mostly, I've mourned for the future.

Four years of G.W. Bush has been a slow nightmare of ethically challenged governmental and corporate collusion. Normally, the bright side of any nightmare is that soon you will wake up.

But it appears now that nightmare will last, possibly for as long we can imagine as Bush has a greater chance to affect judicial nominations up and down the appellate spectrum and even including the supreme court.

The only reasonable outlook is dire.

I know that I'm not alone in feeling this way, and I also know that to those that don't - this probably seems to be an overblown and extremist view.

However, to those who would dismiss the depths of frustration, pain and outright anger that this President and his re-election have created, I would kindly suggest they quietly pay attention because IMO they ain't seen nothin yet.

People are truly, deeply Pissed.

Some I think have become somewhat desperate and are throwing around wild conspiracy theories about how election was "stolen".

I don't accept that view. At least, not yet.

Clearly there are growing concerns and growing reports of voting irregularities and problems. In Florida, large percentages of Democratic Voters apparently voted in overwhelming numbers for Bush - however, it has been argued that this is not the result of vote tampering, but rather simply an example of the "dixiecrat" phenomenon which has existed for many years.

Some voting machines apparently counted backward.

Palm Beach County Logged 88,000 more votes than voters.

In Ohio's Cuyuhoga County, some reports have come out that over 97,000 extra votes (for Bush) were discovered which went over and above the actual number of voters in the County. With the counting of absentee, provisional and military votes just beginning as of yesterday, and a current margin of victory of 136,000 in Ohio this relevalation is like the "Holy Grail" for desperate democrats, but subsequent reports and investigation have shown that the numbers used to arrive at this 97,000 vote descrepancy are somewhat questionable.

All of these allegations need to be carefully and clearly investigated. We need to know the truth and we need to take proper steps to ensure that our voting is verifiable and secure - but I think we need to remain realistic, although apparently in one race the vote certification has placed a Democrat in place of a Republican in one state race (I don't recall which one at the moment), it's little more than a pipe-dream to believe that John Kerry will eventually overtake George W. Bush in either the popular vote or electoral map.

Give it up. That dream is dead.

The majority of the nation really did vote to put the man who sat and did nothing for seven minutes except read "my pet goat" when he was told the nation was under attack, back in the White House.

The nation really does want so deeply to "protect life" that they would put a man back in the White House who put over 170 people to death as Governor of Texas, and who has presided over four years while actual abortions have began to rise, reversing a near ten year decline, apparently since so many people have lost their health-care and fallen into poverty.

America really is so deeply indebted to "moral values" that they turn a blind eye to the unregulated arrest/capture, transportion, detaining and use of torture not just of foreign nations, but American Citizens who've been declared as "Enemy Combatants" in clear violation of American Law, the core tenents of the Constitution, International Law and the Geneva Convention.

This is truly what America wants.

This is truly who America is.

And so I mourn, because the America I believe in - the one where the Constitution is more than a piece of inconvenient paper, seems to be dead.

At one point I thought it was only asleep. Only stunned into unconsciousness by the shock of 9/11. But now I know - it's gone.

Since the election, I haven't been able to bear being around some of my aquintances and friends who are Republican or even Democrats who voted for Bush.

I can't talk to them.

The discussion is over.What is there to say - you're killing our country - you dumb dipshit bastard?

No.

I can't speak. It would be too painful. I understand that reasonable people can disagree on many things. That it's possible to remain civil over these issues.
But I also think there's a point were polite civility simply doesn't reflect the truth. It's a method of denying what one truly feels -- it's a lie.

The truth is - we are decending into full-on facism.

The true ideals of this nation are being murdered. Willfully. Deliberately. Brazenly. This is happening with our full knowledge and (electoral) approval. I don't buy the argument that most Bush supporters still believe that Iraq had WMD's, was connected to Al Qaeda and 9/11. I think they know better.

The truth is they don't care!

More people falling into poverty? They don't care, because it's not them, it's somebody else. People being illegally surveilled by the FBI? No Knock Warrants/Sneak and Peak entry? They don't care. That's someone elses problem, not mine or yours.

More women likely to die as the result of birth complications, and doctors legally barred from being able to save them because of the so-called "Partial Birth Abortion" ban - they don't care, none of their fine upstanding daughters would ever be in such a position. Nope. Never happen.

Frankly, I can no longer find a way to civil about this.

Fuck you people.

Hope is dead.

All we have left - is revenge.

Vyan