I had a conversation with a 30 year old that doesn't care today.

[DUlover2909]

Pasadena, TX -

On our way to work in the company truck I was listening to NPR and he was listening with me, since he's forced to because I control the radio. All Things Considered ran a story about the presidential race. He asked, "Who's winning that now?" I said, "Obama, by like 15 points, McCain 36% and Obama 51%, last I heard." He said, "Some guy told me I should vote or else we'll have a n***** as president. He told me, "I've never voted before and I don't care who wins, Obama a black or Hillary a woman or whoever, because it doesn't matter one way or the other."

I didn't argue with him. He said, "If Obama wins he'll be assassinated." I said, "They can try, but they'll fail."

This was my first encounter with this particular coworker (my regular coworker started out this way, but I have her voting Obama now. I even printed a voter registration form for her and bought the stamps). He is not a racist himself, but he falls under the influence of alot of racist people. I later learned that through other conversations. He is an idiot though. This is what we are up against. The pukes have people brainwashed into believing that all politicians are the same. The fewer people that turn out, the better the pukes results on election day.

I have a college education but I work in a blue collar industry. I run into people like this sometimes. It's just exasperating. I feel like screaming into their ears, "YOU IDIOT! HAVEN'T YOU BEEN PAYING ANY ATTENTION FOR THE LAST 8 YEARS?" But I don't. I know the answer to that question.

The mainstream media isn't doing its job. It isn't their fault. These people haven't heard of Keith Olberman or Cenk Uygur or Rachel Maddow or Lara Logan, or well, anybody that tells the truth. They think their troubles are just part of their reality and the people in power have no hand in their lives and the government is what it is and nothing will ever CHANGE. They aren't happy but they don't understand that the source of their unhappiness comes partly from the policies of government. If they do understand this, then they don't see any distinction between the parties that control the government. That is what needs to CHANGE. I am glad Al Gore said repeatedly, "Elections matter."

Obama has made CHANGE central to his campaign. I think we need to work hard at explaining what that means to these people. They are the undecided voters and non-voters that tip the scale. Not wasting money on senseless defense budgets and Iraq War spending means less deficit. A lower deficit means a more powerful economy and a more powerful dollar. A more powerful economy means people are employed and our money is worth something again and we can afford the things we need easier and we can afford more of the things we just want to have.

These people need to understand that a billion dollars is A THOUSAND MILLION DOLLARS! A billion dollars spent in Iraq in a week (or whatever it is) could make a thousand people in America millionaires! The trillion dollars over a couple of years could make a million millionaires. This might sound elitist, but the truth is, many people don't comprehend these numbers. When I look at my paycheck stub and see what the Iraq war is taking from me I get mad, every two weeks. I am paying for this shit. This charade. This lie. And people are suffering. We need to make people like I mentioned understand the REAL BOTTOM LINE. Otherwise they will remain apathetic and stay away from the polls. They don't see any HOPE.

[TexasProgresive]

1. The Republicans thrive on voter apathy

I remember when there was local talk radio in Texas several host pushing the "they're all the same" line and calling politicians Republicrats and Democans. Then these same naysayers will be first at the polls to vote Republican.

Suppress the vote is the key to Republican victory. Get the people (demos) to vote is the key to victory for the people.

Kick and Recommend.

[progressoid]

12. And they rely on voter stupidity.

Seems to be pretty prevalent over there.

[TexasProgresive]

13. The "stupid ones" they don't want to vote are the likely Dem

voters. They sure don't want to suppress their sheeple.

[GoldieAZ49]

2. "but I have her voting Obama now"

do you now?

[DUlover2909]

3. Yeah I am positive

[fasttense]

4. Tell him to vote for Obama's white half. n/t

[raccoon]

5. This bears repeating:

"They aren't happy but they don't understand that the source of their unhappiness comes partly from the policies of government."

THey'd rather listen to Limpballs and his ilk, who blame illegal immigrants, welfare recipients, liberals, homosexuals, "feminazis" (whatever the hell that is)....did I leave anybody out? :banghead:

[bunkerbuster1]

9. The official Dittohead definition of "FemiNazi"

I've heard it a few times.

Their justification for this sick, misogynist label is that some crazy, radical feminist types (doesn't have to be any actual people, just a stereotype) somehow "advocate" abortion.

These Dittoheads can't seem to distinguish between keeping abortion legal and cheerleading FOR abortion, but never mind that.

Now follow along, please. By "advocating" for abortion, said feminists are creating a "holocaust" of the "unborn."

Which is... JUST LIKE the NAZIS!



Yeah, I know. Just letting you know.

[high density]

6. I have a coworker who thinks the president doesn't really do anything

Then he used veto power and nominating Supreme Court justices as examples of the "do nothing" roles that the president has. That was all I needed to know about his political insight, or lack of it. I don't bring politics up at work, but when others do I am concerned about how out of touch they are with how Washington works.

[treestar]

7. Someone who doesn't care doesn't vote

If he doesn't care, he may not listen to his racist friends either, and they probably won't help him register. He must take "personal responsibility," you know! :rofl:

[GihrenZabi]

8. Funny

See, I also think it doesn't matter from a macro perspective who is the President, either - because no matter who is in the Executive as long as we're held captive by a two-Party system, as long as we don't have term limits such that Congressional service remains a career and not a calling, as long as we allow corporate influence on our politicians (and I don't know that we can ever get rid of this), as long as we remain a capitalist system with as little true regulation and price-controlling as we have - the government is not going to be of the people, and for the people.

We will continue down this path of personal avarice and ambition, watching the United States' position as the worlds' preeminent power continue to degrade, watching our manufacturing potential continue sliding down the tube, the dollar weakening, health care and education continue their tumble into the substandard, etc.

Americans, as a whole, give the President too much credit for things he didn't do and too much blame for things which weren't all his doing.

E.G. - Bill Clinton getting credit for "eight years of prosperity." Show me how he was directly responsible for said prosperity, more so than, say, overspeculation on the value of the entire tech sector of the stock market...is it just coincidence that when that bubble burst things began to unravel?

E.G. - the war in Iraq. George Bush was the public mouthpiece for the war effort, but we all know he's a Grade-A dunce. Was HE responsible, or was it the Neo-Con junta that put him into office? And where do the Congressional Democrats' responsibilities lie? How about the media's?

Nowadays the President is more of a mouthpiece than anything. He can try to set a tone, but without a cooperative Congress his power is minimal. World leaders can ignore him now that the United States isn't such a dominant superpower any longer. Corporate leaders can bypass him through their friends in Congress.

The Presidency, by and large, is a vestigal organ of government left over from a time when the leader of our nation WAS actually a General and "Commander-In-Chief."

One of the best reforms we could enact in the United States would be to eliminate the Executive Branch altogether and move towards a Parliamentary system wherein the Chief Executive of the nation was the head of the majority party in the Senate, and could be removed at any time through a vote of no confidence. Enough of this four-year term nonsense. If you do a bad job, we get rid of you whenever we feel it's appropriate.


Anyway...I support Obama more because he is a symbol of progress than anything else. I have no illusions that he is going to become President (and that feels rather inevitable to me at this point) and suddenly you are going to see the SWEEPING reforms this country so badly needs to survive healthy and strong through the 21st century.

You will not see massive tax reform, social reform, or reform of the very structure of our Federal government.

You will not see a repudiation of the pattern which began at the Gulf of Tonkin and which led to our having a military far too large for our own good which we deploy outside the original intent of the Fathers when they ordered the creation of a national army.

You will not see a health care system which cuts costs drastically, sets limits on what doctors can charge, changes the rules on when drug patents expire, and which covers everyone.

People need to understand that Obama is the lesser of evils, and his most important value is as a symbol of racial progress, that a multiethnic American has taken the highest office in the land.

That's Obama's greatest value, IMHO. He's not going to be a champion for the Progressive Left, which is what I had dreamed he would be.

He's just going to be another Democratic President - which is to say, better than a Republican President - but he's not going to be the arbiter of change he sold himself to be during the Primaries.

Not if he wants a second term...and your first term is just an extended campaign for your second term...

[blogslut]

10. Some people just don't care or pay attention

They only get involved when bad legislation affects them personally.

[zulchzulu]

11. People that cynical or worse hopefully don't vote anyway

I've run into people like your passenger and it really is up to them to figure out what is happening in the World. They can choose to plop in front of the TV and watch ESPN or the endless spew of "reality" shows that numb millions of minds or they can possibly look past the reptilian view of life.

Sometimes it takes an event like someone dying or being sent to war to wake people up. Hopefully it doesn't have to go that far for that passenger.

[baldguy]

14. Tell him if he's really that stupid, he shouldn't vote.

People like him are more harmful & dangerous to America than any terrorist or foreign army.

[Rowdyboy]

15. If you can't convince him, tell him he must own property to vote. He'd likely believe you....

and its one less fool wasting a ballot for McCain.

[CanonRay]

16. Most Americans are Zombies

Plain and simple. We never get pissed off anymore. Look at the French, or the S. Koreans. Mess with them, and their out in the streets.

[Mz Pip]

17. He may be in the majority.

What's voter turn out been in the past few election cycles? Does it even hit 50%? Even if it's 60% that means 40% of the people who are eligible to vote don't care enough to get off their couches to do so.

People need to pay attention but most are too lazy to do so. Maybe it's better they stay home rather than vote on impulse.

[Bucky]

18. When you posted "Pasadena, TX" I thought "oh boy, how bad will this post be?"

And then three lines later I read "or else we'll have a n***** as president."

I really thought Pasadena had gotten better than that. When I was a kid we only knew it as the town the KKK guys came from. Every now and again, I hear about something from Pasadena that reminds me we haven't all of us left the 19th century in this state.