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In reply to the discussion: It's time to examine where my loyalties lie, you judge, I'll just explain my position. [View all]democrank
(11,230 posts)Profound, compassionate, insightful post. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
My class loyalties are the same today as they were nearly fifty years ago when I joined the Democratic Party. Nearly five decades later, I`m pained at what my party has become. The Paul Wellstones are few and far between. What we have instead are "leaders" who consistently sell out to the highest bidder.That`s why it`s such a big damn deal when someone like Elizabeth Warren wades through the cesspool and makes it to a microphone to stand up for people who are all but invisible to the higher echelon of corporate Democrats. They`re all busy consulting with image-makers and waiting for their drivers while the poor are trying to put together a dinner with the $2.16 in their pocket and a trip to the local 7-11.
While the "leadership" deals are being struck and the golf dates are being arranged, legless vets are sitting...waiting months on end for VA disability decisions. While our "leaders" are pretending with David Gregory on Meet the Press, a homeless family is trudging up and down a sidewalk waiting for a shelter to open for the night. While President Obama is obsessing over his next plan to befriend Republicans, some woman who worked 27 years in a woolen mill is wondering how she can get to her chemo appointments....45 miles away....without a car.
There is such a sickening disconnect between the wealthy leaders in Washington and the poor they have failed so miserably. While our standing in the world drops like a rock, members of Congress just polish up their (newly-mandatory) flag pins and call it good. They don`t even bother to pretend they have empathy, they just have to be sure they fine-tune their slogans.
Labeling simple common decency as some "liberal agenda" is laughable. I`ll tell you one thing...the poor people I know and am surrounded by have suffered terribly under our government`s nearly criminal neglect. We should be ashamed of ourselves and the people we elect. I don`t give a damn what Mika says on Morning Joe. What I do care about is the growing number of people struggling and trapped in poverty. Just think about how you`d feel if you thought your kids would go hungry because you didn`t have money to replace the alternator on the truck you use to get to work. If we truly cared as a nation, we`d demand a change in this empathy deficit and would settle for nothing less. Instead, we`re making excuses for bought-and-paid-for leaders who show up for fund raisers but ignore the Vietnam Vet living under the bridge or the despair at the end of the three-hour line at the unemployment office.
There`s a huge difference between change and lip service.