Just a quick note as to why people at times do not vote [View all]

[nadinbrzezinski]

forget the ignorant, against their own best interest and the rest of the lovely talking points people throw here. They are lazy and quite frankly insulting.

I will tell you this people who at times work two to three jobs and worry their sons, and it is chiefly their sons, will be alive at the end of the day, or will be able to come home from the corner store with the gallon of milk, or that they will be able to go to the local fast food place and come home, You want to know why they do not vote?

Their concerns, their needs, their feelings, their live experience is constantly ignored or minimized, or disappeared from the larger conversation, if it even made it to the conversation.

Then they at times hear but if you voted democratic all would be better... care to tell me what party O'Malley is with? How about the current Mayor of Baltimore? Any wants to tell me about my city council member representing some of our most challenging neighborhoods? Actually the three of them? Yes two of them are Democrats (and they are women to boot, and one of them is African American). The third is a hispanic male but democrat. (Never mind these are non partisan offices, but they have not been in reality for a decade or more)

Yet, city hall is yet to fully listen to these potential voters. We tell them that they should try to work within the system and with the system, but we hear it regularly. It is very much independent of party, because the political elites, in both parties, despise the poor. "They don't care, they don't listen."

That phrase summarizes many long conversations over the last two years.

We see it here. We had a thread on the use of the world Thug, which for anybody who has been paying attention, over the last three years, the move to use that word to replace the world nigger by RW politicians, it is a new dog whistle, has been obvious. Yet, some posters here keep denying it. You are doing to that particular poster, and the rest of the folks who happen to be minorities, or those of us who are minorities just not AA, that yes it has happened, your ignoring them feels the same way as my local members of the city council ignoring those potential voters.

Or for that matter the current administration in Baltimore. Yes, they might be making some real changes, we have that problem here, and the local paper might not be reporting it This is what the Mayor said in the morning. Or they might not be doing as much as she thinks they are doing. I am not there, I cannot judge, but in several field interviews from MSNBC reporters and others talking to locals, just like Ferguson, it feels as if I were standing at the park in Mt. Hope talking to local activists and neighbors. The feeling is clear, people do not feel that the folks they at times have elected actually care.

And it is beyond a feeling. There are many studies, that show that if you are black and poor, less if you are hispanic and poor, you will have a hard time getting listened to by politicians. You become a punching bag though. Whether it is by being called welfare queen, or thug, or whatever is the neologism to come in the future.

And no, I will not blame any of my locals who work three jobs and have no time for this silliness for not voting. I know the few who have seen actual good results from pols will be very reliable foot soldiers. But they are far from the majority. As they say, perception is reality.

Though this is more than just perception on whether city hall helps them. Here you go... and if you must ask why people are pissed off... well this is one of the many interlacing causes.

http://www.demos.org/stacked-deck-how-dominance-politics-affluent-business-undermines-economic-mobility-america

http://www.princeton.edu/~bartels/economic.pdf

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/01/why-are-the-poor-and-minorities-less-likely-to-vote/282896/

There is a lot more But I will leave you with this. Many posters here are quite clueless as to how people live or the few opportunities they have, or why they worry.