sotto voce

I’m sick of politics. The more I read about this election, the more I feel sick to my stomach.

I’m an Obama supporter (because of his policies and his personality, not because I’ve spoken to him once before – in Indonesian) and am disgusted by the whole "Palin effect". I can’t wait to watch her interview with Charles Gibson tomorrow – that is I can’t wait for her to make her gaffes. I hope ABC makes sure that she’s not wearing any mini-microphone. With her credulous academic and professional pedigree, I can only suspect her integrity. And shame on you McCain for pandering to women voters this way. I wish I could say that we aren’t that stupid. But judging from crowd’s reaction and what the media has been saying, I have this sinking feeling that many women are buying his Palin shit. I fervently hope that there’s hundreds of million of women out there who are able to see through the GOP deception and distraction tactics and decide to fight against it in a smarter way. Instead of bitching it out there with the McCain-Palin supporter on the media, they just silently and proudly vote for Obama come November. Come on America, I have so much faith in you. 

The one thing I don’t get is that, why do people believe in GOP message that merely promotes fear and hate and sniggers at hope and change. When we look toward a brighter future, when we believe that there’s a better tomorrow, when we are assured that the American dream will materialize at long last, they mock us for believing.

They mock us for wanting a cleaner energy, directing us to "drill, baby, drill." Sure the hell you can drill – drill all you want, as a matter of fact, but only and only if we increase the production tax on oil company (without passing along the extraneous tax on the consumers) and use 100% of that tax (plus gas tax that we all pay) to promote green energy industry – instead of building more roads.

They mock us for wanting to teach sex education in school, for wanting reproductive choice. Don’t they know that choice = freedom? You know what, you can always opt out your kids from the lesson, and should they (God forbid) become pregnant or catch AIDS - you know you made your choice.

I don’t think Obama is a saint or the saviour or a superstar or Mr.Right. He’s not. He’s a politician. He’s human. His policies and actions aren’t always right. But election is not about finding a Jesus H. Christ to save you from hell, it’s about choosing who among two is the lesser evil. Granted that the categories people use to compare the two candidates will vary from person to person, are people fucking serious when they say they want a leader who’s "like them" instead of someone capable? After all the stupid gaffes Bush has made these past eight years, isn’t it time for America to be led by someone who won’t make the mistake of clumping Sunnis and Shi’ites together, and mistakenly repositioning Pakistan next to Iraq on a geographic map? Seriously people…

But these couple of weeks have proven me wrong. From reading comments on political journals, major newspapers and fervently listening to NPR, Fox, CNN, MSNBC, and whatever media I can get my hands on, it seems that once again politics has turned dirty and nasty. I can’t trust anything anymore. Lies are flung about left and right, while I’m left in the middle covering my ears.

Andrew is now accustomed to my sudden profanities outburst while I’m reading the news and he would gently tell me that maybe I’m too naive. Too naive to think that people are able to think the way we do, that people want better future for themselves instead of mucking around in the ditch while mocking passerby. Even after graduation, I’m still pretty much surrounded by like-minded people and have no real grasp of what the real America really looks like. Perhaps America is on its way down, and what better way to characterize that than a majority of idiots choosing another idiot to lead them?

Go figure.