Posts Tagged ‘work
This is the work
In every nation’s life, there come breaking points.
Breaking points are many. They’re points in the road where the great mass of humanity says “Enough”; things as they were are no longer good enough, no longer just enough, no longer decent—human—enough. A point of disgust is reached, where what went before will no longer suffice. Where, indeed, what went before was exactly the problem. Where what went before was a Gordian knot of injustice, unfairness, veritable evil.
We have reached such a point.
The election of a black president, buoyed by a coalition which didn’t conform to the lineaments of the previous holders of power, have made that old, decrepit, dying coalition erupt in one last blast of fury.
We saw it in Texas, in Ohio, in North Carolina, where legislatures have made it known that women are to be kept down, subservient, subject to the will of their betters.
We saw it in the halls of Congress, where the Republican House doesn’t pretend to care about immigrants, but is doing everything it can to stanch the coming tide, hoping that if it engages in one more bit of obstruction their power will be secure. But the future that is coming is as sure as that tide, and the leaders of that House haven’t the wisdom of King Canute, who displayed before his court that he was merely human, and had no power over nature, or the forces of history.
And we saw it, most heartbreakingly, in the verdict which decreed that one could shoot an unarmed black teenager in the street as nothing more than an animal, less than one, and walk away, freedom intact, rights preserved. (We have to ask how free Mr. Zimmerman will be; if he has any shred of humanity, his remaining life will be one of anguish and regret. But at the moment, I’m not feeling so charitable.)
First, a big shoutout to Chips for allowing the lunatics to take over the asylum. Hopefully we won’t all regret it.
So, for my first post here, an essay, because it’s me.
* * *
The world heaved a huge sigh of relief on November 6, 2012, when the results came in and Barack Obama was confirmed in re-election.
Many people worked long hours, gave money they may not have really had, and ensured that President Obama secured a second term. The alternative was too ghastly to comprehend.
And many of those same people, after the election, assumed that, well, that was done, and we could just coast into four years of amity and progress. Nothing could be further from the truth.
As we have seen since the polls closed in November, this version of the Republican Party, dying as it is, is not going to go down without inflicting more damage. From immediately abusing the filibuster “reform” agreed to between Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell, to vowing to hold the country hostage come the next debt ceiling vote, the GOP is making it patently clear that it didn’t learn a single thing from the election. Because the Republicans were returned to the House in the majority, they think that at least part of the country agrees with their policy. Of course, the thing is that the GOP lost the House popular vote, and held on by the skin of their teeth only due to aggressive gerrymandering resulting from its local victories in 2010.
Continue reading ‘A word from Liberal Librarian: The work is never done’
First Lady Michelle Obama sings ‘happy birthday’ for Danielle Falcon
First lady Michelle Obama greets children in the East Room of the White House during a celebration of the “Bring Your Children to Work Day”
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