Days and hours before the election, an eerie calm has descending
on the political landscape.
Days and hours before the election, an eerie calm has descending on the political landscape.
The campaigns themselves are anything but calm, of course. Candidates are jumping on their opponents’ slightest gaffs, clawing at each other like climbers fighting over miniscule cracks in the rock that will save them from falling.
But with many absentee ballots cast, and even more minds made up, the pool of undecided, persuadable Election Day votes is shrinking fast. In some close races, those few votes could make the difference. Get out the vote efforts are in full swing.
Yet the louder they get, the quieter we get, months of wracked nerves finally giving way as we tune out the cacophony, draw a collective breath and cast our lots and ballots. Resigned, we await the results.
As the din dies, the sound you will hear is the sound of change in the wind. Six years of Republican domination is about to end. It has been:
Six years of greed.
Six years of cronyism.
Six years of international isolation.
Six years of a compassionate masquerade.
Six years of undermining civil liberties.
Six years of demonizing loyal opponents.
Six years of budget bankruptcy.
Six years of turning back the clock on environmental laws.
Six years of exploding health care costs, and tens of millions having no coverage at all.
Six years of economic stagnation for the middle class.
Six years of no increase in the minimum wage.
Six years of selling out to the highest K Street bidder.
Six years of distortion and intentional division for partisan purposes.
Six years of ideological domination which rejected compromise and alienated growing millions of Americans.
Six years of a rubber-stamp Congress.
Six years of robbing from the poor and giving to the rich, who now measure their success in super yachts.
Six years of an administration that would start an unnecessary war, then use it as a political weapon against opponents.
Six years of an administration brought to power illegitimately by the judicial fiat of five activist judges.
Six years of ideological litmus tests instead of managerial competence, with results such as FEMA’s performance in New Orleans.
Six years of no accountability.
Six years of ideology trumping science, such as in stem cell research.
Six years of ignoring the looming threat of global warming.
Six years of the intermingling of church and state.
Six years of manipulating religion for secular, partisan purposes.
Six years of religious Ayatollahs telling us how to live our lives.
Six years of relentless assault on a woman’s right to choose.
Six years of obscene oil company profits, while the development of alternative energy sources languishes.
Six years of xenophobia that borders on racism, and would even criminalize priests who help the people who pick our crops.
Six years of earmarks and bloated budgets, even as deficits explode and the rich get tax cuts.
Six years of Karl Rove, Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, Scooter Libby, Tom DeLay, Jack Abramoff, Randy Cunningham, and hundreds of others who have divided us or betrayed our trust.
Six years of lies.
It is time to restore some balance to our national political agenda, to stop treating the interests and views of tens of millions of Americans, liberal and otherwise, as if they had no place in our political dialog.
Will we go to bed Tuesday night knowing that that balance has been restored? In some measure, yes.
And what will we learn from this? Will Republicans be chastened, more willing to compromise for the greater good? Will Democrats, after so long in the political wilderness, put forward a competing program that reaches for the broad center of the body politic?
Will we avoid political bloodletting? I doubt it.
We will still have a commander in chief wielding a veto pen who sees himself as “the decider,” unyielding in his approach not just to Iraq, but also to a host of domestic issues. The man who has enjoyed such a tight grip on power for so long will have to have it pried from his warm, live hands.
So when we wake up Wednesday morning, it will feel like a brave new world of possibilities. For a moment.
Then the presidential election season for 2008 will begin, and we will be right back into fray – with two years to wait before real change can take hold.
