I know I know there are so many arguments that the government won’t be able to effectively run a health care plan. The public option. Whatever. The government can be very inefficient in a lot of things. However it comes down to a bottom line that it seems like the conservatives and republicans just don’t want to talk about…

Every single person in this country deserves good quality health care.

Whether they work or not. I don’t think health care should be tied to a job. I think that’s an outdated, weird idea. Even every homeless person on the street should get good quality free health care. It should be a human right in a country as advanced as this one. No one should go without.

I work for the government and I have seen lots of inefficiencies. I’ve also seen a lot of efficiencies. The post office is run just fine. The police do a dang good job. There are a lot of government agencies that are just fine. And I don’t know of any other way to get health care to everyone, regardless of employment, other than the government running it.

So that’s my 2cents. I am tired of the debate, just pass the bill already! Maybe a natural appetite suppressant will even be covered and I can lose some weight! LOL I’m just kidding, but I would love to see everyone getting good solid health care without having to lose their homes. And I do have good health care already. And I am not afraid of losing mine!

Eight years ago I was so wrapped up in men and my life was a mess, I didn’t have the personal resources to spare to even care who was running for president.  Looking back, it amazes me how addicted I was. Just like a junkie looking for another fix of a drug, I was looking for another man fix, totally and completely obsessed.  Now, however, I have a self, a ME, and I’m extremely thrilled about it! Now I can concentrate on what really matters… not on a mess of emotions that were empty and pointless and a spiral of ill health.

Today, I’m much better, and hopefully the country will be getting better as well. I personally have to stop spending as much but not because of the economy, but because my husband isn’t working. And his not working isn’t because of the economy, it’s because of his own personal issues. Though the economy will probably come into play too!  Anyway… I’ve been overspending myself and I have to stop. This means no new stuff for the Hermit Crabs, and no new order from Clean Run either. BLEH.  Oh well, I’ll live, and it’s good for me to be responsible myself.

I’m just thrilled Obama is now President Obama! Yay!  I look forward to the years to come and I’m excited for some drastic change!

I am Ecstatic about Obama being our next president! When I was driving into work yesterday I even found tears in my eyes. I know I know… politics are usually a topic I stay away from, and I don’t get emotional about. But I hate hate hate hate hate Bush, and I was afraid we’d have 8 more years of Bush politics if McCain were to be elected. I was pushing hard for Obama and I am thrilled he was elected!

Finally our country has gotten smart. In 2004 I was so disappointed that our country reelected Bush… what were people thinking? Gads I dunno. But I’m looking forward to the next four years, and hopefully the next eight years.

Sure Obama is coming into office to a country that is not in very good shape, and he has an awful war in Iraq to deal with that idiot Bush started and shouldn’t have in the first place. I don’t know how to pull out of Iraq. I understand that a sudden total pullout might be bad. But we have got to bring our men and women home. We shouldn’t have been there to begin with. Ugh.

And I’ve heard that instead of decorating herself with lots of diamond rings like McCain’s wife, Obama’s wife dresses sensibly. Plus, they plan on rescuing a dog, not buying from a breeder. yay!

I sure do hope I don’t eat my words… and end up disliking Obama in the next four years. And what really scares me is that Obama might get assassinated… he better not. I hope he has some good security, and idiots won’t try it.

And I keep forgetting that Obama is black. There’s so much on the news about him being our first black president. Well, that is something I didn’t consider at all. I like him as a man, and as a candidate. And woo hoo for the USA finally being mature enough to have a non-white president. But that’s not what concerns me. I just am glad he’s a democrat, and that he seems to me to be a good human being! And he won, Yay!

Have you voted today? I must admit… I didn’t, and I won’t vote today! LOL that’s because I already voted by mail about two weeks ago.

I wanted to find a badge that just said I Voted, but I didn’t find one in five minutes and then gave up and posted this one instead.

I hope everyone votes. The lines are supposed to be very, very long today. Voting by mail is the only way to go… though I do worry that my ballot got lost in the mail. I guess I just have to assume it made it to the polls and my vote counts.

Speaking of voting… what do you think of the Electoral Collage? I think it’s is old and outdated and needs to go. The Electoral Fairness Project is a site that has information about passing an amendment to do away with the Electoral Collage. I would prefer to have a true majority vote instead of the Electoral Collage.

Happy Voting Day!

BallotPedia

I was given a link to this site recently on a comment on my previous post, and I just had to devote a whole post to this site. Tyson of Politics 2000 left the comment. And I just have to let everyone know!

I love wikis… such as WikiPedia, I love how the community can support them. Sure, sometimes a bad seed gets in, but for the most part good solid people with good solid information take care of it.  And BallotPedia is no different. If you are wondering what is going to be on your ballot, what the issues in your state are, and if you also want to help contribute to the wiki, you really probably want to check this site out.

You can find your state and see a lot of information about your ballot, what relates to you, and the issues you will find on your ballot.  So don’t go in to vote unprepared.  Eductating one’s self is so critical in this day and age. And there is just no longer any excuse for any of us to not educate ourselves and find out as much information as we can about the things that matter. And honestly, elections matter. Our government matters. It’s what influences our every day lives, our families, our communities, and even our earth.  So I encourage everyone to vote, and vote informed!

A few months ago I signed up for the mail voting program and I got my ballot in the mail already. This will be even easier, and I love easy!

I had no idea all this stuff would be on my ballot. Not only the presidential election and the voting of judges in and out, but we have five constitutional amendments here in Utah that are on the ballot. Two propositions (I have heard rumors of them), and various other things.

I don’t know if it exists, but I would love to see an online resource, or even a print resource, that has all the ballot items listed. Maybe links to pro and con statements. I’d love to be able to do some research.

I also hated getting to the polls and being surprised at what was on the ballot and not feeling prepared to vote. Now I can be prepared.

Do you know what will be on your ballot? Are you sure you know? How did you find out? How do you vote?

I’m just curious.

I am also pro gay marriage… which I think it is a human right, and will not vote for anyone who opposes it. It’s discrimination, pure and simple, to be against gay marriage. It’s like saying blacks and white’s can’t marry, or Jews and Lutherans. Same darn thing in my humble opinion.

I am also vegetarian, I don’t eat animals to survive. And actually I lean toward the side of the Animal Rights movements as opposed to Animal Welfare (nutshell, AR believes that animals are our equals and we shouldn’t ‘use’ them for anything or own them. AW thinks we do own animals and they are property though we should take good care of them in that way).

Sarah Palin, however, seems to think that shooting wolves from airplanes and helicopters is perfectly fine. For more information about that, check out the article on Slate Magazine. I think that is horrifying and where is there any sport in that anyway? I don’t hunt… though yes I do understand the food chain and I don’t believe there is anything fundamentally ‘wrong’ about killing to eat. If you have to, which humans no longer do. But that is just nuts.

I do find a great deal of humor, though, in the Saturday Night Live skit on the vice-presidential debate. It made me laugh!

Some say he is too young… well, Kennedy was young. And Kennedy was a Democrat. Even though I was too young (okay I wasn’t born yet) when he was president, still I like his image and I like what he did. I think Barack Obama will be similar.

Obama is fresh and has new ideas. I don’t care about experience… especially POW experience. How would that make for a good president? I don’t know. I want someone without experience who will come in and make some drastic changes.

Change the health care system. Get rid of all discrimination including sexual orientation (not that he supports that, but Democrats usually do so more than republicans). We need someone who is pro-choice for all us women who want control of our lives. And we want a president who is much, much more environmentally responsible!

I cannot go into details mainly because, like other things in life, I don’t remember details. I hear something I like, I absorb into into my mind and heart, and I decide I like it. And that’s how I feel about Obama. And I don’t post much about politics because I’m afraid of getting the facts wrong. But then, I’ll probably be corrected, eh? LOL.

I do not think off shore drilling is any kind of solution to the gas prices being so high. Any sensible person (lol how’s that for a slam?) can see that opening offshore drilling wouldn’t help our gas prices for years to come, maybe five or ten years, and we really would love to have some relief now!

I want to find and listen to Al Gore’s speech today… I heard that he has a goal of having all our electricity powered by renewable energy sources in 10 years? I heard that on NPR. Gotta go find that speech. I like Al Gore. I voted for Al Gore. I wish Al Gore would have won in 2000.

If McCain wins, like it’s been said, we’ll be having Bush’s third term starting off. Personally, I’ll be on the edge of my seat come November, probably even staying up late, to see who wins. Here in Utah usually the republican wins, but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to be out there stamping my Democratic Vote on election day! (Or before, since I usually vote through the mail lol).

So anyway… that’s my 2cents!

It’s called Sustainable Democracy. And it caught my eye… mainly because I’m a democrat, though democracy does not mean democrat (something I had to grasp when I was older than a kid…)

I am continually frustrated (as I have blogged about in the past) by the tediousness of going to work every darn day and… as Joe said in Joe vs. The Volcano “I was too afraid to live my life so I sold it to you for $300 lousy dollars a week.” Okay that’s not a direct quote, that’s from memory, but it’s close. So the author of Sustainable Democracy says, on his http://www.sustainabledemocracy.org/founder page:

Society, school, government, everyone had promised me that the purpose of all this education and working was to make things better. But the more I went through life the more it became apparent that it was about filling up life with objects and busy work, and not with making things better.

Emphasis Mine. His words strike a chord in me. I mean… I’m frustrated with selling my life for (a bit more than) $300 a week. But still, I’d rather be out there learning, growing, bettering humanity… and sure sure, I could pull myself up by my bootstraps and try to do that. But my anxiety, and the system, and my job… my wanting to eat and have a roof over my head and my dogs’ and husband’s head, rather prevents me from stepping out of my comfort zone and running headlong into the wind.

On his Mission page, he writes:

We have spent centuries working to achieve better technology, philosophy, and social structures to make our lives better. We should begin bringing that effort to bear and create the society that renews and rejuvenates us, not perpetuate the one that sucks us dry until we are of no great use to it.

“Suck us dry” is right. Ugh.

So why can’t we have a society where we are all alive… and doing things we love? Instead of slaving away at a desk 40 hours a week. 40 Hours A Week! It’d rediculous! Maybe there can be something else… something better. Some type of society where we follow our passions, improve humanity and the earth, live sustainably and lovingly… where we don’t have to do mindless (even if not mindless, still tedious) tasks day in and day out to survive?

Sure sure, all through the ages humans have had to work hard to get that food and shelter and dog food… but still… Health Care, good quality solid Health Care, should be available to everyone in our society. No questions. And so, shouldn’t the ability to live life to it’s fullest? In ways we do not yet imagine?

He has three posts, this is the first, to “help introduce and explain the basic ideas and tenets of Sustainable Democracy“. I have started reading these posts, and I am going to go read some more.

Another great quote that speaks for itself:

It should not be the effort of any society to produce more. It should be the focused effort of every individual to innovate in their area of expertise to produce the least quantity needed at the minimal effort required to produce the best results.

Okay, blow my mind, why doncha. I wish I would have thought of this stuff.

My friend said that Utah Democratic Primary Elections is an oxymoron here in Utah. Well… perhaps. Utah always goes republican. And you know if Mitt Romney wins the republican vote, he’s who Utah will vote for.

For the most part I sit and watch while the rest of the country makes, hopefully, a decent decision on president. The last couple of elections I’ve been embarrassed that our country has chosen George W. Bush. I don’t like him, want him gone, want him OUT of office and I have for 7 years now.

Anyway, I finally found the website that’ll tell you, here in Utah for 2008 and other years too, what the location of the next election will be for you:

Salt Lake County Elections. Of course this is just Salt Lake County. I am in Salt Lake County so sorry if you are not, but maybe it’ll give you a starting point. On this page you can put in your address and it’ll tell you about the next election. Since the next one is the primary in Utah, it is the one that comes up.

However, I also signed up for the Vote by Mail option. So hopefully they’ll send me a ballot in the mail for the primaries. But I don’t know if they will, or if it’s only for the main elections. Now I gotta find out an answer to that question. hrmph.

So I’ll put in my little tiny liberal voice from under the barrel of the Utah conservatives. But hey, I try!