If Donkeys and Elephants Could Fly

"If you think the next appointments to our Supreme Court are important, you know that elections matter. If you live in the city of New Orleans, you know that elections matter. If you or a member of your family are serving in the active military, the National Guard or Reserves, you know that elections matter.

"If you are a wounded veteran, you know that elections matter. If you've lost your job; if you're struggling with a mortgage, you know that elections matter."

To which I would add:

If elections matter and they decide public policy, then why didn't you, Al Gore, fight harder in 2000 when the election that you won was stolen? Why didn't you call upon your supporters to march on the Supreme Court and demand that the vote count be continued and that all the votes be counted?

If elections matter, then how come John Kerry didn't fight harder in 2004 to make sure that the votes were counted, and why did he give up even though he actually won the election?

If elections matter and you want your vote to count, how come the Democrat-controlled Congress in 2007 decided that it wasn't going to do anything about the hackable electronic voting machines until at least 2010?

If elections matter, then why hasn't the 2006 mid-term election that gave the Democrats back the majority in Congress produced any of the changes that people thought they were voting for when they voted for Democrats? Why has Congress, instead, actually given Bush and Cheney more money for their wars than the White House asked for?

If elections matter, then how come the Democratic Party won't listen to majority sentiment that demands impeachment and an end to the war?

If elections matter, then how come the “peace” candidate in 1964, Democrat Lyndon Johnson, after defeating the “war” candidate, Republican Barry Goldwater, then proceeded to escalate the war in Vietnam?

If elections matter, then how come Samantha Power – national security advisor to Obama until she had to resign after she called Hillary Clinton a “monster” – told BBC in April 2008 that Obama "will of course not rely upon some plan that he's crafted as a presidential candidate or U.S. senator"?

If elections matter, then how come Sen. Barack Obama, elected to serve the people and the Constitution, doesn't understand what "high crimes and misdemeanors" are, and won't do anything NOW about a president and vice-president who are flagrantly and repeatedly violating the law, carrying out invasions based on lies, threatening to do it again any week now, and who have admitted torturing people?

If you think that elections matter, then how come we always hear it said: "Vote. It doesn't matter whom you vote for. Vote." How come it doesn't matter whom we vote for?

If donkeys and elephants could fly, then we’d be fine. What we do know for sure, though, is that donkeys and elephants can lie.