Yes, we are…because it is not your America…it is everybody’s America
A while back, during those infamous 2009 TOWN HALL meetings where the operatives were sent in to disrupt and sabotage any attempt by elective officials to meet with constituents; there was this woman in the back of the room that stood up and sobbing, almost in tears uttered those famous words. I can still hear it in my mind…it was said with a tortuous twang and a thick as molasses accent.
I immediately became indignant when I heard it…for many reasons; but the one that stood out in my mind was the audacity to even be upset because minorities are “taking away her America”. I thought that blacks and Hispanics also called America home and the underlying fear she had was precisely that…that all these dark skinned, foreign sounding individuals were taking away from her something that was traditionally and exclusively hers.
After the 2010 elections when a lot of voters were misled and lied to by Republicans to obtain victories in many places; it became abundantly clear that the Republicans were catering to these people’s insecurities, fears and racism.
It didn’t take long for the Republicans to demonstrate their agenda, to not do any of the things they promised during the campaign but instead, Republicans embarked on a scorch-the-earth, radical endeavor to go after the middle class and all the safety nets, to reinforce those xenophobic fears and to systematically exclude all sorts of people from Blacks to Latinos, from seniors to gays, from Labor Union members to pro-choice women. It is exactly what this woman wanted, it is exactly what the Republican Party stands for: a WASPHROM organization (White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant, heterosexual, rich old men)
