My Silly Reason

I just watched a video on YouTube, and I re-remembered a conversation I had with my brother Jimmy.

In 2008, I had gone home for Thanksgiving.  I remember my sister Mary Ann telling me that Jimmy had specifically requested that I drive him and Mercedes to my brother Sammy's house for our Thanksgiving get-together.  I did and we spent much of the day with one another.

The 20-minute drive was mostly quiet.  We drove through the countryside taking a road north of Roscoe along a highway lined with hundreds of windmills.  At one point, while Jimmy stared out the window, he said, "This is good.  It's about time that these poor farmers came out on top."

We arrived at my brother's house and family was bustling around.  Jimmy sat quietly taking it all in.

We left that evening and attended church together.  After church, we went to Wal-Mart and bought some candy for Mercedes and some flowers for mom.

Family Picture 11/08

We returned to Sammy's house and enjoyed the company.  Some watched football; we ate; some laughed; we took family pictures.


As the evening came to a close, I recall sitting on the porch with Jimmy and my sister Helen and we started talking about Obama, whispering because, well, Obama wasn't the choice for most of my family. I don't remember if my sister Helen remembers this or not, but Jimmy said he had voted for Obama because he felt that he would make an impact on the kids that needed it most --- the underprivileged. (Some readers don't know this about Jimmy, but he spent most of his life working with juvenile delinquents.  He always championed for the oppressed.)

I knew he had voted for him without him telling me as much.  I knew what Jimmy meant, and if one hasn't worked with troubled kids, it would be hard to understand his point.

I just finished watching the video again and it put a smile on my face to know that Jimmy was right.  It's perhaps a silly reason to vote for someone, but it's my silly reason.

I will vote for Obama again.



* My brother Jimmy died of cancer the day before Obama was inaugurated into office.

My Case Against Romney, My Case for Obama: A list

I’ve gotten on Facebook a few times to vent about Romney. It’s no secret to people who know me: I’m voting for Obama. And I’ve made my case, in several fits and spurts, but I’ve not yet put down my thoughts in a cohesive manner.

Here is my first attempt.

The core of why I’m not casting a vote for Romney has to do with trust. I’m talking about the core of the person and the core of what will follow later in my posts. I just can’t trust him.

Here are a few reasons why:

1. I can’t trust a candidate who changes his position as frequently and with such lack of care as does Romney. He has changed his positions on almost every issue: women’s rights; the auto bailout; the effect of the stimulus; foreign policy; and yes, even domestic economic policy.
2. I can’t trust a candidate who has made millions of dollars by sending American jobs overseas to the country that he calls one of our biggest economic adversaries -- China.
3. I can’t trust a candidate who is less than transparent with his taxes.
4. I can’t trust a candidate who says he will close loopholes for the rich when most of his money is tied up in offshore accounts, which essentially means taking advantage of loopholes.
5. I can’t trust a candidate who tells me that he will close loopholes but won’t provide details about which he would close.
6. I can’t trust a candidate who can’t give a straight answer on whether or not he supports equal rights, yet has said in the past that he does not.
7. I can’t trust a candidate who doesn’t support Latinos and whose immigration advisor wrote the Arizona immigration law.
8. I can’t trust a candidate who tries to make political hay with an ambassador’s death (before even knowing the details).
9. I can’t trust a candidate whose military advisors will be the same people who advised George W. Bush.
10. I can’t trust a candidate who wants to ramp up military action in the Middle East.
11. I can’t trust a person who thinks corporations are people and should have the same rights.
12. I can’t trust a person who calls himself bipartisan when the record clearly shows he has not been.
13. I can’t trust a person who bullies others.
14. I can’t trust a candidate who claims he is unemployed and can relate when he has never lost his job and makes more money in a day than most do in a year.
15. I can’t trust a candidate who believes that 47% of the American population is not worth his time and says so (but only behind closed doors to rich donors).
16. I can’t trust a candidate who, in order to avoid military duty, went to France on missionary work. (This is not to say that missionary work is bad; rather, the point is that he did this to avoid military service.)
17. I can’t trust a candidate who says that our military must grow and that we must spend more taxpayer dollars on this, even after we have already doubled the budget of the military under Bush’s term in office.
18. I can’t trust a candidate who left the Office of Governor of Massachusetts with the same approval rating as George Bush.
19. I can’t trust a candidate whose running mate wants to make Medicare into a voucher system.
20. I can’t trust a candidate whose running mate voted to privatize Social Security.
21. I can’t trust a candidate who denies the impact of human behavior on global climate change.

There are more reasons, some of which I am likely to address at a later time, but the gist of this is

…. I …… just…. can’t...don’t….. trust…… him.

* I will add links to this list.