Overwhelming grief

[pegkerr]

Rob, who had been watching the election returns all night, came and woke me about forty-five minutes ago and held me while I cried.

Injustice won. Now this man who has made an unprecedented power grab for the executive branch, who authorized the use of torture, who has trampled on civil rights, who has lied and lied and lied to the American people, is going to have the chance to reshape the Supreme Court for the next generation. Bigotry won. I cannot bear it that the bigot's side of the argument on a civil rights issue that I care so deeply about, gay civil rights, was what pushed conservative voters out to the polls to return this man to the White House. Stupidity won. He totally lost track of who attacked us on September 11, he has ignored the threat of North Korea and Iran, he has failed to guard the borders, he has taken us into an unjust, immoral and unnecessary war which has killed our people and a hundred thousand Iraquis, spent our resources, inflamed the world against us and multiplied our enemies a thousandfold.

And we have rewarded him by returning him to the White House.

I have never been so ashamed to be called a Christian, if people who call themselves Christian feel that they are honoring their religion by voting for him over John Kerry. I have never been so afraid and so grief-stricken for my country, no, not even after September 11, because this time we are administering the wound to ourselves.

Comments

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

I can appreciate that pro life is an important value to many people who don't consider themselves to be bigots. However: I have tried and tried to think of a way to say this that doesn't sound too caustic. I'm sorry, but I just can't. Please forgive me, but I absolutely have to say this:

Pro life? Tell that to the families of the 100,000 dead Iraquis. And to the families of the people that Bush personally as Governor of the State of Texas sent to the gas chamber.

[kokopoko.livejournal.com]

It's a war. There are casualities.

I don't believe in the killing of innocent people. If they are proven guilty of a crime beyond a doubt then yes society would be better off without them if their crime is so heinous as to deserve death.

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

If you're so against the killing of innocent people, then how can you possibly defend what George W. Bush is doing in Iraq??? Iraq is an unjust war. See, e.g., here, which discusses the distinction.

And as for the death penalty, I reject it utterly. As Gandalf put it, "Many who live deserve death, and some who die deserve life. Can you give it to them, Frodo? Do not be so eager to deal out death and judgment."

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

This all being said, we are certainly agreed that it would best if we could make abortions as rare as possible. But not by outlawing them or making them more difficult to obtain. Better to increase funding and support for birth control and family planning services.

Which, by the way, George W. Bush has done all that he can to cut.

[(Anonymous)]

Apparently (there is a link in Loligo's LJ to the statistics) the abortion rate in the States has _increased_ under Bush, for the first time in a very long time. Women have abortions, on the whole, when they do not have the knowledge of how to prevent unwanted pregnancies, or the economic and social resources to raise unexpected children. Bush is doing his level best to eliminate that knowledge and those resources.

So for those who are opposed to abortion, voting for Bush may have been emotionally satisfying, but was in reality counterproductive and will probably cause more abortions to happen in the next four years than would otherwise have been the case. Though some of them may be more illegal and dangerous and possibly also involve the death of the woman, which is surely not a plus from anyone's point of view.

maggie h

[lkw18.livejournal.com]

I agree. That's the thing with Bush. He refuses to support safe sex and birth control education in schools and only wants to promote abstinence. While abstinence is all fine and dandy it is dangerous to tell kids that is the only option. Because what will happen is that they are going to be having sex anyways but won't have the knowledge of how to protect themselves and this will create a higher percentage of STD's and pregnancies.

[fraught.livejournal.com]

It's a war. There are casualities.

I don't believe in the killing of innocent people.

These "casualties" were innocent people as well. They did not deserve to die, especially not because of a lie.

[http://users.livejournal.com/anam_cara_/]

Because innocent people don't make up the bulk of war casualities, right? Particularly in this war, which supposedly ended sometime ago.

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

And again, I'm really sorry if my words seem harsh because I feel so deeply about this. I'm trying trying trying trying, really I am, to not let that grief slop over into bitterness toward the people who voted to re-elect him. Really, I am. I have to, because I know that somehow, this country has pull itself together. I hope you can understand.

[amandageist.livejournal.com]

Pro life? Tell that to the families of the 100,000 dead Iraquis.

Iraquis would have died under Saddam Hussein, had we continued to do nothing. They would have died for his whims, and his cruelty, and his monomania, much as so many Russians died for Stalin. At least there is a goal, and a reason, and a chance, and so some *meaning* to their deaths, in a larger pattern. When death will occur regardless, the larger pattern must count for something.

And to the families of the people that Bush personally as Governor of the State of Texas sent to the gas chamber.

The Governor of Texas is not terribly powerful, the way things are set up here. About the only thing he could have done was halt an execution at the last minute. And he opted not to do that, not to have the executive branch interfere with the judicial system at the last minute. No system is perfect, but this one has several automatic appeals and checks on it; and after deliberation, he decided to let the system operate rather than step in. It can't have been an easy decision.

~Amanda

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

All right, I have written and erased this response three times, trying to ratchet it down. Forgive me if I still sound waspish. I do want to keep the dialogue going.

Iraquis would have died under Saddam Hussein, had we continued to do nothing.

So we were justified in killing them? We killed those 100,000 Iraquis. Not Saddam Hussein. We did. And given that the stated reason we went into Iraq (WMD) turned out not to be true, I'm having a hard time seeing the larger pattern that justifies that blood on our hands.

It can't have been an easy decision.

I would find it easier to believe that George Bush struggled at all with these decisions if he hadn't mocked Karla Fay Tucker before denying her appeal and sending her to her death.

[amandageist.livejournal.com]

You don't sound waspish. And you're entitled to, in any case. At least you're not out there questioning the morality, humanity, intelligence, or right to breathe the same air of those who supported Bush, which so many seem to have done, reflexively.

And given that the stated reason we went into Iraq (WMD) turned out not to be true, I'm having a hard time seeing the larger pattern that justifies that blood on our hands.

Two points: (1) That was *one* reason, not the only one. (2) I'm not ready to say it wasn't true. They still occasionally turn up WWI and WWII leftovers in France, which is a far more populated country. And we all but telegraphed our date of arrival, allowing lots of hiding, moving, or destroying time. So I'm not ready to admit a blanket statement that we were 100% wrong about that.

Moral choices are bitches. Especially when they involve other lives. As I have said before, I don't think objectivity is possible given the limited facts available, and so you're left with either being prepared to trust your leader, or not.

if he hadn't mocked Karla Fay Tucker before denying her appeal

Cite? Quote? I'm not remembering.

~Amanda

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

Cite? Quote? I'm not remembering.

"Devil May Care" by Tucker Carlson, Talk Magazine, September 1999, p. 106

"Bush's brand of forthright tough-guy populism can be appealing, and it has played well in Texas. Yet occasionally there are flashes of meanness visible beneath it.

While driving back from the speech later that day, Bush mentions Karla Faye Tucker, a double murderer who was executed in Texas last year. In the weeks before the execution, Bush says, Bianca Jagger and a number of other protesters came to Austin to demand clemency for Tucker. 'Did you meet with any of them?' I ask.

Bush whips around and stares at me. 'No, I didn't meet with any of them,' he snaps, as though I've just asked the dumbest, most offensive question ever posed. 'I didn't meet with Larry King either when he came down for it. I watched his interview with [Tucker], though. He asked her real difficult questions, like 'What would you say to Governor Bush?' 'What was her answer?' I wonder.

'Please,' Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, 'don't kill me.'

I must look shocked -- ridiculing the pleas of a condemned prisoner who has since been executed seems odd and cruel, even for someone as militantly anticrime as Bush -- because he immediately stops smirking.

'It's tough stuff,' Bush says, suddenly somber, 'but my job is to enforce the law.' As it turns out, the Larry King-Karla Faye Tucker exchange Bush recounted never took place, at least not on television. During her interview with King, however, Tucker did imply that Bush was succumbing to election-year pressure from pro-death penalty voters. Apparently Bush never forgot it. He has a long memory for slights." [Carlson, Talk, 9/99]

[amandageist.livejournal.com]

I hadn't read that before; it does seem out of character for him. The key to Bush's position there, though, is not in the mocking, nor in the (slight) implication by the author that Bush's failure to intervene was retributive. It is in this quote:

'It's tough stuff,' Bush says, suddenly somber, 'but my job is to enforce the law.'

Letting the judicial system operate--trials, appeals, the works--and then stepping in to change a legally-arrived-at outcome is not enforcing the law; it is circumventing or obstructing it. Failing extreme circumstances, Bush felt himself bound to let the system operate, because that was the law. This is what judges have to do, as well, and what people never believe they can--look at the point of law and the broader picture, not their individual positions. The law may or may not be a good law; but it is the current law of the land, and he saw his job to be to enforce that law.

Not a good answer, for those who (a) don't believe in the death penalty and (b) don't like Bush. If it helps--for those of you who hate him--consider him Snape and not Malfoy. Give him, at least, his personal integrity.

~Amanda