On the day after the seismic shock that was the Republican tidal wave in this last midterm election, recipe many people compared it to being hit by a bus. As they pulled themselves up from the pavement, cialis the question was inevitably asked, cost “What happened?” To say “I never saw that coming!” would be disingenuous indeed as everyone could feel the bus roaring down the road whether through the copious number of polls taken, the lethargy of the voting public, or their disillusionment in the politics of the day. The fact is that only 1/3 of eligible voters actually showed up on Election Day. One third of the nation decided, by the power of their vote, what or who would be the contingency representing the entire nation at the “seat of power”, both nationally and locally. This is not democracy; this is un-American on its face. Letting go of the tired politics of fear and division is difficult to do, when playing with those particular tactics actually drives “certain” types of people to the polls to cast their vote while literally turning others away, or at the very least turning them off and effectively accomplishing the same thing.
Win or lose, both outcomes have consequences. Should one party tout their overwhelming victory as some kind of mandate from the public when only 1/3 of the public actually voted? Should there be some type of reconsideration by the other party regarding the policies and agenda that unquestionably got them elected by a larger part of the electorate than those who participated in this last election? An electorate, it must be noted, that historically voted them into office twice without equivocation? Has anything really changed as we find ourselves looking forward to the continued recalcitrance in government? It is hard to believe that anything has really changed when the same rhetoric and proclamations of overturning the Affordable Health Care Act and threats of impeachment should the President move on his promise to DO Something on Immigration Reform continue to fill the airways & media outlets on a daily basis. The elected representatives the people send to Washington, or to the state houses throughout the nation, are supposed to be doing the people’s work. They are elected to public service and yet it seems the battle lines of dogma, ego, and personal historic legacy continue to dominate their agendas and have very little to do with actually serving the people or the needs of the people who they are supposed to be representing. No wonder there is so much apathy within the voting population!
No matter how pathetic and inconsequential the “politics of the day” may seem to you or me, the consequences of this past election are real and will reverberate throughout this nation with irrevocable consequences on its PEOPLE for at least the next decade, if not beyond. Two steps forward…. three steps back. We cannot continue to go on this way. Folks better get off the side lines and get involved in the political process, or as a people we will never progress enough to actually become the nation we were intended to be.
Dr.T
Tawnya Pettiford-Wates, Ph.D.
Founder and Artistic Director
The Conciliation Project and
Associate Professor
Virginia Commonwealth University
DrT@Margins2theCenter.com
www.theconciliationproject.org
Up Next Week: Why we MUST go back to move forward!
