Bittersweet conversation with my sister in-law

[spinbaby]

I usually avoid talking politics with my sister in-law. She's very active in her extremely evangelical church and her politics have always run along the lines of , "God wants me to vote for George Bush and stop abortion."

So imagine my surprise when this little lady tore into Bush with a vengence with a major rant about how he's destroying the economy.

As it turns out, she realized that she's going to reach retirement age in about five years and that she'll probably have next to nothing to retire on. That, and she's developing health problems and she's worried that she'll have to retire even earlier with even less to retire on. She's been divorced for decades, has always worked hard at low-paying jobs, was unemployed for almost a year once, and now realizes that her total retirement savings amount to $3800 and that social security is probably going away at about the time she wants to retire.

I'm glad she's seen Bush for what he is, but I sure wish she didn't have to lose her retirement dream to do it.

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. That is so sad. I wish people would wake up and think before

they reach a crisis point.

[HughMoran]

4. Yeah, it's like people will vote based on other people's interests

before they realize they should vote based on their own best interest.

At least the woman is finally seeing the light

[GreenPartyVoter]

8. Well if other people's interests were equality, justice, and the social

network that would be cool. But when they vote on only abortion, gay marriage, terra secruity they often shoot themselves in the foot because they uphold their principles regardless of what the end result will be for them.

Some might think that's honorable but y'know, ya gotta right to both have principles AND a life free from fear of poverty.

[HughMoran]

12. Yes, and I notice if this woman is 5 years from retirement...

it's not likely she is probably not going to be getting pregnant any time soon. So she is trying to make abortion-related choices when it couldn't possibly affect her in any way.

I'm sick of the "terra security" issue too. I really think that the FEMA fiasco is making people fear their "leaders" now more than they fear terrorists. So maybe the terra issue is a lot less of an issue

[catmandu57]

16. Welcome to DU Hugh

Great name, and great to see a newbie that gets the joke, moran with an A.

[HughMoran]

20. Thanks!

:hi:

[jackster]

22. great to have you HughMoran

likewise, I love the name!:toast:

[HughMoran]

23. Thanks, and back at ya!

:toast:

[bettyellen]

13. and look how she's abandoning her principals now over $$$$$.

i just love to see that.

[SoCalDem]

28. With republicans, it always comes down to money..n/t

:)

[bettyellen]

2. screw her, she's so chrisitian but she only cares when it comes to roost

at her house. yeah, that's mighty christian of her, and equally as intelligent. what, is she hearing a different tune from god these days? or else how can she forsake her gods orders over $$$$? selfish little idiot. :puke:

[spinbaby]

6. How Christian are you being?

I think it's better to rejoice when someone sees the light than to condemn them for having been ignorant.

[bettyellen]

11. the light she's seen is how it affects her finances. i didn't claim to be

a christian, i'm saying she sounds pretty misguided that she ever was one. feh, she's one windfall away from going back to her narrow minded phony christian self.

[spinbaby]

17. You don't know her

I DO know her. She's a very kind-hearted, hard-working woman, not, as you say a "phony Christian." Several years ago when she was ditched from her company and was unemployed for a long time, she "discovered" religion. Personally, I think her church preys on the downtrodden by telling them that everything will be okay if they just follow along in the right way. Right now she's got some major conflict going between what her church tells her and what her heart tells her.

[bettyellen]

27. and she'd be pleased as punch with the party still if her own future

didn't suddenly look so bleak. her lack of foresight is sad, as is her conversion at a weak period in her life.
she maybe intends to be "nice" but that's kind of useless if you have your head up your butt. has she been waiting for the "trickling down" to occur since the reagan era? LOL.
i have a message for her, "Ca-ching, money from heaven!!"
Naaah, just kidding, you're still broke.

[madrchsod]

3. there are alot more people like her

than we know..i know how this lady feels cause i`ll be in the same boat that she is in in 8 years

[barbaraann]

5. FDR invented retirement for working Americans.

n/t

[LibDemAlways]

7. Pitiful that a single woman close to

retirement age with no nest egg has been voting for repukes because she thinks they are going to stop someone she never met from having an abortion.

Amazing how people don't wake up until the Bush "squeeze the little person" philosophy hits close to home and squarely in the pocketbook.

[existentialist]

9. A classic case of "can't afford to be a Republican"

but doesn't know it--or didn't.

[area51]

26. "... they are going to stop...."

LibDemAlways said:

"... they are going to stop someone she never met from having an abortion."

I like the way you phrase that.

[AirmensMom]

10. One of the best bumper stickers I ever saw says

"A working person who votes Republican is like a chicken voting for Frank Perdue." She's not the only one looking forward to a dismal retirement.

[Straight Shooter]

14. So it all comes down to money.

What a pity.

[Whoa_Nelly]

15. For those who didn't understand what BushCo has been doing all along

It takes an epiphany to bring the truth to the light of day for them. So many who stood staunchly behind Bush and cohorts did so because of the emotional appeal and/or because it didn't directly affect their lives. This has always been true in the arena of politics. There are those who woke up after their sons or daughters were killed in Iraq. There are those who became aware only after their jobs were shipped out of the country. The witch hunt on Clinton, and the eventual evisceration of him through exposing his sexual proclivities, had great massive appeal to the fundies and anyone else who took pride in moral outrage evoked by a campaign of hate: Karl Rove did his job quite well during that time.

And so it goes now. Your SIL is now directly affected by a future that suddenly looms as a day to come when things will be even more difficult than all the years she strove to get to that point in her life.

Am glad to read that one more American has turned a corner in realizing that BushCo is a destructive machine. And, although she is ranting about Bush the Puppet Idiot Boy, it's at least another person who will perhaps look more closely at what is going on within our government as we move toward the 2006 and 2008 election cycles.

[fortyfeetunder]

18. Think there will be a change of focus for her?

Like now she sees she paid a misguided focus on making personal decisions for people she has no control over, what's her next plan?

She can't retire, not unless she wins a lottery ticket!
She realizes she got had by *, what's her next move?

[spinbaby]

19. I don't know

She's still very involved in her church--I don't know how widespread her viewpoint is within her church. She seems to now feel that Bush is some kind of a demon masquerading as a Christian. I'm not going to discourage that viewpoint.

Her retirement plan now is to work as long as possible, health be damned. This woman has been working hard for over 40 years and has yet to make over $20,000 a year.

[Justice]

21. It appears it is all about her.

Makes me really question exactly how "christian" she is.

[Cha]

24. AND, bushwa is not only going to

ruin your sister-in-law's retirement but the Whole God Damn World!

[msmcghee]

25. The underlying problem that we face . .

. . is that progressive / liberal government is essentially reality-based problem solving. It's justification lies in always searching for the best, most equitable solutions to society's problems - that continue to change with new technology, new types of pollution, new diseases, etc.

It would be so much easier if we could just say that God wants us to do it this way. Or, the free-market will solve the problems for us if we just cut more taxes.

Those approaches enjoy the warm fuzzy good feelings that those platitudes generate. It feels so good to know that God is on your side, etc.

Reason and logic generate no such comforting feelings - only the assurance that whatever solution we work out today probably won't work next year because the world will have changed so much - so we'll just have to keep trying to improve things and adapting.

Reality based solutions are often like the bitter tasting medicine that our mothers wanted us to take. Like paying for hurricane relief by canceling the Bush tax-cuts as Bill Clinton proposed last week.

The repuke voters are kids who grew up and decided they would never take their medicine. Or, they grew up ready to take responsibility for the future by electing serious problem solvers to governmemt - but then fell for the year 2000 neo-con sales-pitch (and the Media led destruction of Gore) because it just felt so much better than what we liberals were saying about being careful with the surplus and using it as a launching pad for greater equality and opportunity in America.)

Until Bush II, no repuke, not even Reagan, has been so willing to attack reality-based solutions in favor of complete dogma - and the devil take the hindmost.

Their leaders (Bush's neo-con enablers and Rove) understand this very well. They tell the voters that they don't have to give their tax breaks back to the mean liberals, they can too pray in schools, etc. - because God and Repuke ideology (read the free market) will take good care of them.

Faith-based feels so good. But reality bites. They have used Clinton's surplus and great economy to postpone that big bite until they are far down the road and will have destroyed all the progressive gains that we have made since FDR.

I'm convinced that Roberts (and O'Conner's replacement) will be the most important step in dismantling our progressive institutions. Every thing that's happened so far was a prelude to getting the SC under firm control of conservative ideologues.

Now, no matter who we elect, or what legislation we pass to repair the damage - we'll face a SC ready to reverse it and declare it unconstitutional - on whatever ideological grounds they decide to use against us. And there won't be a damned thing we can do about it.