After Election Ponderings

I am one of those voters so often refered to as swing voters. I guess that comes from the fact that I have never felt either political party represented my views. I chose a profession where I knew I would never make "good money"-but I do not decry the people who made other choices and for them gathering wealth is important. After all , I will never be able to donate enough money to build a museum! Having worked in the inner city I truly "get" the cycle of poverty . I am all for offering a hand up-just not a hand out. I believe in a right to life-but take it one step further-I believe in the right to a decent life! Which means funding education and health care for kids. I am either a left leaning conservative-or a moderate democrat. I would rather fund education than prisons, rather build roads than great government buildings, and think that government should allow the churches to handle issues of morality. Remeber when people felt shame? Now-a-days- no one is to blame or responsible for anything.

So elections for me usually end up with a check sheet where I check off which candidate most closely represents my views-or another way of putting it-I vote for the lesser of two evils.

What has amazed me most about this elections turns out to have little to do with either Mc Cain or O'Bamah. What has amazed me is the amount of time and press given over to basically sensless dribble. I really could have cared less than Hillary wore pant suits and could never figure out why that was even a topic of discussion. Next came all the to do about Sarah Palin's shopping and the RNC buying her clothers, and finally way too much discussion over Michelle Obamba's black and red dress. I mean really folks... we are dealing with global warming, a Michigan econmony bordering on melt down, a war with no apparent exit strategy, a declining dollar,and a housing market that basically chewed up most of our investment-and we want Sarah Palin to give back a couple of outfits?

So while the nation is busy patting themselves on the back that we have risen above racism to elect an African American President-we sure have nothing to be proud about when we examine the way we treat female candidates!. I am not a Hillary fan-(basically just don't buy into the socialized medicine) but no male candidate had to tolerate the attention to her dress, whether or not she should cry, or discuss the role of first husband. Now much of this was laid squarely at the feet of the ultra right wingers-then enter Sarah Palon who was herself a right winger. She faired no better than Hillary. While critisms of her intelligence and experience may well have been on point-notice how most of what we know about Sarah had to do with clothing. She came down from Alaska where -well it's so damn cold nobody really cares what you dress like-and is thrown into a 9 week media frenzie. She gets criticized for answering the door in a towel-when other candidates were messing around while their wife was dying from cancer. Next they take her shopping in the "Best Stores"-and folks of course she spent alot-those places don't even put price tags on everything. Frankly I think it is in really poor taste to ask her for the clothing back! I am thinking most people would not want to wear cast off designer underware!



Even Ophra has taken a hit for standing up for her candidate with much discussion about the "Oprah Factor". Gee Powell had more influence on decision than Oprah did! But the implication in all of this is pretty darn clear-women enter politics at a huge disadvantae and are criticised for things that are not even looked at in male candidates. So while as a nation we celbrate change, hope and new ideas-we still have a long way to go- in the way we treat female candidates. It appears that the glass ceiling is quite thick and bullet proff.