Reply #75: My parents are probably the biggest influence on my political views. [View All]

[vixengrl]

They aren't especially activist, but they are certainly informed and opinionated, and they started me off to be the same. They encouraged me to read the newspaper and watch news on t.v., to develop my opinions about the world around me, they shared their opinions--which was the best part, because they could tell me about the history of things. They helped learn to evaluate how what a politician is saying relates to my life--as opposed to falling for happy horsecrap.

But for actually people who are politicians, I'd say Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton are influential. Carter is important because during his presidency, looking back, I'd say he had a crappy hand. The energy crisis, the economy--these things maybe couldn't be helped during four yrs. The hostage crisis I have my definite suspicions about. But he greened up the White House and encouraged conservation. He may not have done all he wanted, but tried. And although they say there's no second acts in American politics, he's had one hell of a good post-presidency. Today he is still seen as a man of great character, intelligence and optimism. That smile is a piece of Americana that is never too corn-pone for me.

Bill Clinton could be up there with FDR, for all of me. I voted for him in the first ever presidential election that I could vote, and I knew he was a winner from Arsenio and MTV Rock the Vote. I knew, because his ability to relate to people, his charisma and all that, never seemed put-on. They are the real thing. He genuinely knows and cares about people, and his skills at the business of politics are outstanding. I would say he is a true genius and world class statesman. I know there's a little Machiavelli in there, and a little Don Juan, too. But the one makes him a great politician and the other makes him an understandable and flawed human being. They do nothing to smear his legacy for me.

Last--I got this little collection of biographies when I was six or seven through a reading program at my public school--the collection was from Dell books as I recall. The people who were "biographed" were Louis Armstrong, Eleanor Roosevelt, JFK, Helen Keller, Amelia Earhart, and Martin Luther King,Jr. And for learning at an early age about civil rights, feminism, international affairs, disabled people's rights, etc....I think that little boxed set did a great job. And so all of these people, in a way, are influences, too. I don't still have that collection--but man, I'd give it to any school kid. I say--and I sure got this from my parents--you're never too young to learn.