THE 2012 ELECTIONS…TEN DAYS LATER

MAYBE a ray of hope…..this past week, have heard some good thinking from once out-of-touch Minnesota Republicans – lamenting their OWN actions for election loss in Minnesota. I think they are transferring too much of the blame to the amendment fiasco, but it was encouraging to hear:

“We have to spend less time trying to vote people off the island and more time figuring out how we can work together behind common goals.”

Well….dah! Personally, I think a new second party would serve Minnesotans better than a new dress on a tired old out-of-touch elephant….especially since what I have NOT heard yet from them or their national good old boys counterpart is a recognition that we cannot RE-LIVE the 20th century.

Let alone those that have yet to learn the lessons of the 19th century – and still do not understand they cannot secede – that is exactly why thousands died 150 years ago. (This one is hard issue for me, since for many years, I have wondered WHY we insisted on keeping at least the South a part of the US….and often think we should re-evaluate Lincoln’s stand….so I’m including the movie in this weekend’s activities – hoping it prevents me from rallying to a new cause of LET THEM GO…..:-)

Before I am willing to take another look at the Minnesota bunch, they will have to show me evidence – not only of collaborating with DFL to get MN issues addressed, but they need to support their cries nationally of “business” with one who’s made it in today’s global, digital, collaborative world…not a veteran of the very time in business that created Sharehold Value as top priority, rather than consumer and employees.

AN INNOCENT ELECTION VICTIM…Lennon Cihak is a far better person than I am……as he was denied the sacrament of confirmation in the Catholic Church because of a picture of him holding a Vote No to ban same sex marriage, and yet, he pleads for people to understand his church rules.

Meanwhile, I fume because of what that means in his parish and perhaps the whole diocese…..If you voted no, you may be voted off the island and denied the comfort of faith in which you were raised……That just opens so many issues and arguments, I know better than to comment further and have been arguing with myself to remain silent.

Unfortunately, I am a historian at heart…so I know marriage as a sacrament in the Catholic Church did not begin with Christ making Peter the first head of the Church….indeed, marriage remained a civic act only and did not become a sacrament in the the Catholic Church until SEVERAL HUNDRED YEARS later – when the church, motivated by financial difficulties, adopted it as a sacrament – allowed to church members for a fee!

So I’m glad I am of a different faith and live in the USA where I can say….the treatment of this 12 year old boy may be an isolated incident…OR it could be a signal of that unbending self-rightousness that led to the devastation of the Crusades and the Spanish Inquisition..and eventually, to the rejection of that Church by many..

On a more rational and less emotional level, I’m tentatively optimistic….I think Obama learned in the first term, that until all the “elder” statesmen are voted off the island, he cannot govern totally by collaboration and consensus. His positioning of his “mandate” from the election signals to me that as he needs to, he will indeed use power and a few old tricks from the 20th century. That is a sad state of affairs, but to me, reflects more on the elders in Congress than it does on Obama….we shall see as we now LEAN FORWARD to join the rest of world in a century of promise that lies before us.

That is, if we survive the die-hards that did not get the message…that are trying so hard to make Benghazi into a crisis that exceeds the importance and devastation of 9-11.

Of course, I do not mean to imply that thousands of deaths in our own country from a terrorist attack , followed by 100,000s of deaths of Americans and Iraqis/Afghans CAN be compared to Benghazi-in either case, Americans died, there was considerable confusion as what happened was sorted out, and both ultimately were tragic  incidents in American history.

But even though I myself  did not support the second retalitory action – the Iraq War- there is NO COMPARISON to Elder Deomocratic Statesmen support of President Bush and the country to the ANTICS of McCain and company on Benghazi…led initially by Romney.   Patriotism, not Politics should be the principle that comes to the fore ANYTIME we as a country are attacked and citizens of the USA are killed.  It is a travesty to see McCain…and Graham to some extent…try to make this a POLITICAL ISSUE especially when McCain in particular has been honored all his political life for serving his country in a war that had more than its share of hiccups and mistakes.

But all in all, ten days later, I am proud to be part of the American public  that voted YES to four more years of Obama- a citizen who recognizes that men are fallible and I have yet to see (or to have studied) either party or representatives of parties that came before Lincoln rule without criticism, mistakes, misunderstandings and deep emotional debates among the masses.  So, I am taking a deep breath as here we go again…