This morning I took a stroll with my pooch around the block where I live in Jacksonville, Fl., a modest middle-class neighborhood of mostly hardworking people, predominantly white but also with a sprinkling of blacks and Hispanics as well as some eastern European immigrants. I suppose one might term my neighbors "common" folks, a label Democrats once embraced, but one elitist Republicans were not beneath viewing with disdain. These folks to me seemed sort who in the past would vote for the likes of FDR, HST, JFK, leaders whose mere initials could prompt a glow in the eyes and smile on the face of "common" folks. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/08/coleman-spokesman-humilia_n_133026.htmlhe
Having noticed yesterday a number of newly planted political lawn signs, I was intent today upon taking a mini poll of my neighbors' partisan persuasions by counting the signs. To my surprise, the statistical result was: 9 McCain-Palin signs, and only 2 Obama-Biden signs, both on the same lawn.
Abundantly recognizing that my sample size was indeed magnitudes short of conferring statistical validity, still I wondered how this could be even in my data miniverse, with on the one hand a Republican regime that for the past eight years had lied us into a shameful war slaughtering a million-plus innocent people, had employed (my God!) torture, had trashed our Bill of Rights, and who in a final flash of greed had gifted a trillion dollars to the criminals who exploited then destroyed our economy....while on the other hand we have the Democrats who....hmmm....yes....whose then majority Senate endorsed unprecedented power for Bush to unilaterally attack anyone. Democrats who approved every one of his fund requests over six years to continue the slaughter, who did in fact not stop the torture, who raised but token resistance but never trumped the eradication of our Constitutional liberties, and who led the votes for the Wall Street bailouts in the face of overwhelming disapproval of the voters both Democrat and Republican.
Astronomically more valid polls than my exercise now all predict an Obama-Biden victory, and all reasonable people--including even I--believe that is what will happen. And yet my neighbors would have it otherwise, to this liberal's surprise and disappointment. But then again, is there really much difference politically and morally between treacherous lying greed mongers and their accommodating so-called opposition that makes the treachery possible? And one might also suspect--could both sides be beholden to the same masters?
And one might also wonder: what kind of results would be generated by a poll that included a major political party with a demonstrated record of integrity, courage, intelligence and goodwill --such as does not exist in America today.
Rafe Pilgrim, after "a life largely wasted on hard honest work," found himself a jungle of turkey oak, scrub pine and giant palmettos up a dirt road running east of Crystal River, Florida, which neither school busses nor the U.S. Postal Service dare to assay. Sharing a house of his own design with Spanky the cat, Darla a pit bull, and a foundling of mysterious breed named Alfalfa -- all collectively known as Our Gang -- he spends his time "productively: writing poetry, working for peace, and gazing at the sky."
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Central High School of Philadelphia, University of Maryland, Syracuse University, University of Maine, Ursinus College, Air Force Intelligence (Washington D.C., Germany), Ford Motor Company, Philco-Ford Corporation, Eighth Day Gallery, Phi Kappa Phi, Romey Everdell Award for Journalism,(1988), Hole in one (1998), and struggling to find America ever since 2000.
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