I’m sad

I have a very sad story to tell, so have your hankies at the ready.

My sister just started college (she’s 30) and called me for help with a paper she’s writing. She supposed to write an argumentative paper on something affecting society today. Ok. Here’s the gist of the conversation.

Me: You can’t think of anything? What about the ports deal?

Her: What’s that?

Me: You haven’t heard about that? Ok, well, it’s only a couple of weeks old. (then I give her my completely left-leaning version)

Her: I hadn’t heard that.

Me: Ok, well, what about the NSA surveillance scandal?

Her: I haven’t heard about that either.

Me: Well, what about the Intelligent Design debate?

Her: What about it? (I proceed to give her my leftist version of said event)Wow! I’m surprised by that. They’re all trying to take “God” out of the “Pledge of allegiance” I can’t believe they’re going to let that happen.

Me (my voice dripping with venom): They didn’t. That’s the point. Whatever. What about Dick Cheney? Did you at least hear about that?

Her: Oh, yeah, on all the hunting sites they’re talking about how he was “can hunting”. How do you know all this stuff anyway?

Of course, she would know about Dick Cheney from reading hunting web sites. I should’ve known. And once again I get the “The ACLU is evil because they’re taking God out of everything!”_[1] My head and heart really hurt when I finally managed to get the hell off the phone.

So a couple of things are illustrated by this conversation that kind of concern me.

First, it shows how disconnected some regular (I use that term loosely when speaking of anyone related to me) people are from politics. They’re too busy to bog themselves down with the news- in any media- and read only to lift themselves out of their mundane lives- and politics is too depressing. My sister works full time and has two kids, plus she’s now attending college. She’s married, but her husband is a little, um, randy and doesn’t really help much with house, bills, and/or kids. She spends a lot of her time doing things that affect her directly right now. If she is at all indictitive of the rest of Ohio, then we’re screwed. Because the only way these kind of people are going to find time to make it to the polls is if there is an issue that directly affects them right now. Of course, the Repubs always fall back on the “anti-gay” platform _[2] to get their people out to the polls. We have the war and government abuse of power. But is that enough to get people out? We can point to the Ohio Club of Corruption, but is that strong enough when people have so much more to worry about (like food, clothes, and medical bills). I suggest that the focus be on getting jobs to Ohio and staying here. That would really get people out. Give them hope for a good job in the future and they might just make that trip out.

Second thing that concerns me is…my sister is a closet Bush supporter. That is the real travesty of that conversation.

_{[1] My sister is one of those people that pass along junk emails like “How to tell if your husband is an animal…pass this along!” and “God loves you that’s why I sent this to you…pass it along to ten people of burn in hell for eternity!”}

_{[2] Last election it was gay marriage, now it looks like gay adoption.}