Time to Pay Attention

We’re getting to the point in the Presidential Campaign where it’s becoming more important, I think, to start paying attention.  Which is too bad, because we’re also at the point where we’re all sick of this never-ending campaign that feels like it started back when Moses was a child, and we just want it to friggin’ END already. Well, we’ve got maybe 9 or 10 more weeks to go, so suck it up and pay attention, OK?

This week is the Democratic Convention, where Barak Obama will receive the nomination for Democratic candidate to become President of the United States.   There will be a floor vote, as there has been for the last 140 years or something, and many delegates will cast their votes for Hillary Clinton, as that is how the votes fell in their state primaries.  Good, they should do that.  I’m glad she’ll get some recognition for how close she came to winning the thing.  But it needs to end there.  For people to say that they won’t vote for Obama because he’s not Clinton, or because he didn’t select her for VP, is ludicrous.  Truly.  Talk about the embodiment of cutting off your nose to spite your face.  Do you really think there’s no important differences between McCain and Obama, and our country will not suffer if McCain is elected?  Do you really want to go to war with Iran? And what about reproductive choice in this country?

Which brings me to my second point.  I know that most of you know this already, it’s not NEW, but just in case some of you aren’t paying attention, did you know that the Bush administration has a proposal out that may redefine birth control as abortion?  That’s right, taking a pill every day to prevent yourself from having more children than you want, need, or can support, could be considered ABORTION.  The proposal classifies abortion as “any of the various procedures — including the prescription, dispensing and administration of any drug or the performance of any procedure or any other action — that results in the termination of the life of a human being in utero between conception and natural birth, whether before or after implantation.” You might think that the pill wouldn’t be included here, because it doesn’t result in the termination of a pregnancy, it just prevents it, but there are many who argue that hormonal birth control and emergency contraception can prevent the implantation of a fertilized egg.  Gosh, I’ve been on the pill for a long time now…I can’t even begin to calculate how many ‘abortions’ I’ve had, and here I was, trying so hard to be responsible!  My great grandmother would flip out at this news.  She, who had 5 children in 7 years, and begged her physician brother for advice on how to STOP HAVING BABIES without cutting off her husband from the bedroom. (Which was the solution of her mother-in-law, after giving birth to her 8th or 9th child, no more sex.)   Her brother sent her a letter with advice (which I assume was nothing more than the rhythem method), and told her to burn the letter after reading it, because it could get him arrested in those times.  Do we want to go back to that? And lest you think that McCain would be better than Bush in this area, don’t bet on it.  In 2003, he voted against a measure that would have required insurance companies to pay for birth control prescriptions.

So, it’s time to pay attention.  If you wanted Clinton to be president, get over it.  She won’t.  Allowing McCain to become president won’t change that fact in any way.  So pay attention, listen to what these men have to say, pay attention to the deeds that they do, and vote for one of them.  K?