I made a promise...

Today I promised my state senator that I'd post this.  He is -- in case you're wondering -- a Republican.

So I am.  This is the email that I wrote him today.

The subject line was "Explain why the Medicaid expansion isn't available YET."

Michigan and GOPFail

I didn't read this in the news. It's something I know.

The State of Michigan decided a bit ago to use an online system instead of paper notices about things like food stamps and low-income medical benefits.

Okay. Because employing postal workers is that liberal thing, something about JOBS, and who needs that?

That way someone's benefits could be quietly cut. No muss, no fuss, just one day the dollar amount changes to zero.

Those people might be working multiple jobs, not have computers, not be able to get online -- maybe no car, disabled, or simply unable to get to their local libraries. Which are also having to cut hours.

Again, that job thing. They aren't job creators, those people have no impact on the economy; more of that tired old spin. The pretense that their kids shouldn't be fed; they had to be born, and once that happened, all bets were off.


I know it's extremely dystopian to think that the people who aren't worrying about jobs now want the "not like us" people to die off.

Like liberals are something you can outlive. Like people who are in unions don't matter. Like people oughtn't have health care unless they're quite rich. Like infrastructure isn't important.

Because y'know, only those poor people and middle class people use roads. Yeah, AS IF. Food comes on roads and bridges; all goods travel. FedEx ships by road and air, you know. Then the post office delivers to everyone that FedEx doesn't. Funny about that.


As if society, our shared community, does not matter.

This... this is bull.

You don't have to agree with who I vote for. That's not what's important. But I'm angry. I'm angry for people I've met and those I know, people who needed that money. What if my great-uncle needed food stamps?? He doesn't have a computer and he's past ninety. What about the people I know who've suffered bankruptcy for medical bills? Foreclosed because they lost jobs...

The list goes on and on.

This is a shared construct, society. It's how we humans survived so many things.

Food doesn't teleport to you. Water doesn't get to your house by magic. You do not live without a huge interconnected network of people, goods, services, infrastructure. People made your car, the bus, that truck your food comes on.


I love reading about dystopias. I hate living in them. I'm living in one now. Our world keeps getting closer to madness every fool day. Who put these people in charge?? I swear that it's like the Arab spring taught many politicos nothing.

Is that the world they want? Revolution? Or do they really think that people will roll over? Did they not notice the Occupy movement?

I don't recommend us reliving the French Revolution on a worldwide basis either.


And I wept a bit last night when I saw how my legislature treated two female Michigan lawmakers. I am deeply ashamed. I know the Michigan Republicans have been on this insane anti-democracy kick. But--! This is not the world I signed up for.

This is wrong. This skewed world needs to be fixed, changed, corrected, made better. Let's do it: Time to change things for the better.

Because I want the kids I know to be proud of us and to be glad for their world -- our world. Not ashamed. None of us should have to suffer this madness; and since I've been mad, I have some cause to say that.

How CAN they...

How can legislators attack the teachers? Where would Abe Lincoln have been had he not learned to read? Heck, where would WE be?

I've always loved Lincoln. What would he have thought of his party now??

How can they attack the post office? Yes, the good ol' USPS. Congress forced the post office to pay 75 years worth of pensions -- yes, seventy-five! -- in ten years' time. Thus reducing their finances even further.

Ben Franklin was our first postmaster general. He also [says Wiki] set up our first lending library. I wouldn't be me without the library -- all of them. What about you?

It's all about the money. I bet you can feel where this is all going.

Yep. Shut down every institution that is for the common good -- the education, the postal service, the libraries, the health systems, everything. Because if you cannot pay, say the conservatives, then these should be sold at the highest price to the profit of someone else.

Privatize.


This so feels like a very frightening book instead of real life. I wouldn't read Animal Farm in my teens. I hated Brave New World, but had to read it twice. [Funny, I love apocalyptic fiction, though.] I managed to squeak out of reading 1984.

How can we stop this? Speak out. Don't hide. Spread the word about the laws you can't stand, about the things happening where you live. Tell people all over what you think.

The world is changing, everywhere. I'm advocating speech, so don't be shy.

The greedy bastards doing all this act like they have no shame. Maybe they don't. Doesn't matter. Society has a lot of tools for social change, and shame is not the least of them.

But pressure, now, pressure is a lovely tool.

And for the ones now in office who pretend that it's time to push their personal moral beliefs into law -- time to fire their misbegotten selves. This ain't what they were hired for.

This is my world too. I'm proud of all of the people in it. It doesn't matter if we never meet, if we don't eat the same things or speak the same languages. A lot doesn't matter. But this matters; to make things change, we all have to step up and speak.

I feel no need to return to the pre-industrial era, thanks. What about you?


But if you heard me cuss half the time lately, you'd think I wished I was violent like certain relatives... two of my favorite board games in the 80s were Family Business and Tom Wham's Gangsters.

I was good at those games. :D