Ya know - maybe we just need to stop for a moment and think about something

[The Straight Story]

I know we are all caught up in the next presidential race (hard not to be with the recent announcements of who is running and such).

But damn - we won in November. Pelosi is ruling the roost, and for the first time in a long time we have folks in power that represent our views and values.

Naw - they ain't perfect. And I am glad we call em on the carpet when they screw up, just like we did the rethugs. We won't let our folks get away with the crap like the right let their folks do. But man oh man, it is damned sweet that the upswing is in our favor right now.

We have a lot of issues to tackle, and I am sure they won't be speedy enough for most of us (myself included) - but at least now I have some hope that things WILL change.

In some ways I think people were way off base. There was no major attack before the elections. Osama was not trotted out. The election was not stolen by machine.

It worked as it has seemed to work for so long - people get tired of the shit and vote out the lame asses who didn't do jack for em.

It seems too often people want to play it all safe and make changes go so slow a dead turtle could run past em. Always with the fear that if we do X then people won't vote for their group next election. Safe, slow, methodical changes.

But we have seen how much things can change and how quickly. And we need to use that and get things changing asap for the people. The government exists for us, and not us for them.

Finally, there is some hope. So many on DU and elsewhere have done their best to see this day. Would that Andy was here to see it, and others.

We have a lot to be thankful for - and I for one and damned happy things finally went our way.

We won. And that feels damned good right now.

[catmandu57]

1. We need to let these people do the job we hired them for

The next election is lightyears away, we have to clean up the elephant shit before we can even see what needs done, people are in too big a hurry, we have the republics in check, there is time to do things right.

[The2ndWheel]

2. "but at least now I have some hope that things WILL change."

"The government exists for us, and not us for them."

Is it me, or do these two ideas contradict each other? If the government exists for us, then why do we have to hope for anything? Shouldn't we just change things, and not just hope things will change? If we elect Democrats into office, and we still have nothing but hope to hang onto, what did we change? How is the government existing for us? If we have to hope after electing people that "represent" us, don't we exist for the government to continue to hold power over us?

[Beer Snob-50]

3. We have to hope for change

because Government is run by people and people have freewill. We have to hope that people will stick by the principals that got them elected in the first place and not all of a sudden get swayed by that very vocal minority that is known as talk radio. Also there is the sway of corporate interests ("Come on Phil, vote to continue the war in Iraq or I will be forced to close my munition plant in your district and put 4000-5000 members of YOUR voting public out on the streets)

We in Massachusetts consider ourselves a liberal state, but if you listen to talk radio, you would think we are a bunch of homophobic neanderthals.

[The2ndWheel]

4. "hope is a longing for a future condition over which you have no agency"

"it means you are essentially powerless."

http://www.orionsociety.org/pages/om/06-3om/Jensen.html

The more I understand hope, the more I realize that all along it deserved to be in the box with the plagues, sorrow, and mischief; that it serves the needs of those in power as surely as belief in a distant heaven; that hope is really nothing more than a secular way of keeping us in line.

Hope is, in fact, a curse, a bane. I say this not only because of the lovely Buddhist saying "Hope and fear chase each other's tails," not only because hope leads us away from the present, away from who and where we are right now and toward some imaginary future state. I say this because of what hope is.

More or less all of us yammer on more or less endlessly about hope. You wouldn't believe—or maybe you would—how many magazine editors have asked me to write about the apocalypse, then enjoined me to leave readers with a sense of hope. But what, precisely, is hope? At a talk I gave last spring, someone asked me to define it. I turned the question back on the audience, and here's the definition we all came up with: hope is a longing for a future condition over which you have no agency; it means you are essentially powerless.

[Zodiak]

5. an excellent point n/t

[shadowknows69]

6. I feel pretty helpless

and it doesn't do my sate of mind or body any good. I think we can feel good that at least we add to the public discourse, even if on DU we are mostly preaching to the choir. Its that one wanderer on the net that might find us and give thought to something they hadn't before is why I still write on here and I'm sure the reason people like Straight Story do even when they've considered leaving for personal reasons. If it all goes to shit anyway I believe in a cosmic justice somewhere that will notice, that our deeds however small will be counted. We spoke when others wouldn't. We bear ugly truths when ignorance would be more blissful. We are among the fighters. Be proud DU.

[JeffR]

7. Amen! and a K & R!

:kick: