The Rest of Us

I laughed out loud when I heard that conservatives were having a hissy fit about Hillary Clinton’s emails while she was Secretary of State. It’s come down to emails, I guess. She came out today with an explanation that makes sense. I knew it would though. She’s too savvy to get caught that way, and even threw herself under the proverbial bus by conceding that she probably should have carried two cell phones in lieu of one. I would agree with her on that, even if only on the not-so-off chance that conservatives would try to use it against her. She probably should have hired a full staff tasked with just that purpose, anticipating Hillary hysteria.

Strong women are anathema to the misogynistically inclined. They look for every way possible to undermine any success strong women achieve. It’s a religion with them. And they’re off and running again. Colin Powell said in an interview that he used his personal email account as well while serving as Secretary of State. Not that it matters to the red meat throwers out there. The Bush Administration “lost” all sorts of emails, but that was just an unfortunate series of events. Sort of like their entire eight years in office.

But here’s the thing. All this does is make people take a second look at Hillary. I wish she were a little more like Liz Warren, but we may find out after she throws her hat into the ring just how populist she really is. And that will be a good thing. Should Democrats have several options to choose from? Probably so. But at the end of it, I can’t see anyone else who is strong enough to stand up for the American people. And it’s going to take someone of that level to deal with all the nastiness that exists now, because that’s not going away any time soon.

There’s a momentum that’s been building since twice electing President Obama. Currently it’s expressed as racism. When a woman is elected President, it will shift to sexism and misogyny. They’re already primed and ready for it. But then so are the rest of us.

The rest of us don’t like racism, sexism, ageism..you name it, if it has an “ism” attached, then it serves no one. It only destroys. And the rest of us are tired of that. We’re tired of legislators who try to upend our right to vote, as well as any other constitutionally protected rights that we enjoy as citizens of this great country. We’re tired of misogynistic legislators (women as well) who think they have a right to tell women what we can and can’t do with our bodies, and who re-define rape in ways so insulting and demeaning. Could we ever have imagined anyone saying that the act of rape shuts down any pregnancy from occurring? Yet it’s become commonplace to hear some moronic legislator on a news broadcast opening his or her mouth with nothing but stupidity coming out. You know, like the state legislator who thought we could swallow a camera so that it could take pictures of our lady parts as it comes out the other end.

Another thing the rest of us are tired of is the richest among us writing the rules. SCOTUS has seen fit to deify itself by deciding that corporations are people. And after Romney used the phrase, my friend, I can’t say it anymore..even to friends. I hear his voice saying it, and it seems spoiled somehow. All anyone wants to do is live. No one is asking to have expensive homes, cars, or yachts. We just want to make ends meet, feed our kids, put a roof over our heads, and be safe. That’s pretty much it. And a job would be nice, with an employer who doesn’t feel compelled to usurp worker rights. We’re not asking for anything complicated, yet it seems to be impossible for the more conservative among us to respond to the basic needs we all share in life.

No one wants a free ride. No one wants a handout. People do want their dignity, however, but that seems beyond the pale for some legislators as they work endlessly on undermining the simple dignity of providing health care insurance for our families. To be able to take your children, or yourself for that matter, to the doctor without having to compromise which bill you pay shouldn’t be something that anyone in this country has to deal with. We should have single payer, Medicare for all. Everyone pays in according to their income level. Those below a certain level would pay nothing. We can and should have done that. But apparently we’re not supposed to do anything that actually lifts people up in our society. Conservatives think nothing of shutting down the government when they don’t get their way, and now forty seven senators have attempted to undermine our President once again by sending a letter to Iran in an effort to derail the nuclear deal that’s currently being negotiated. They thought they’d let the Iranian government know that any nuclear deal that’s struck wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on. Wow.

These people are out of control. They’ve gone rogue. It’s like the chaos that ensues when children have too much sugar. Mothers understand this. Maybe it will take a Mother-in-Chief to get us going in the right direction again. One who’s used to the childish antics currently on display.

I don’t know who our next President will be. It may be Hillary, which would be nice, because I think we need a little balanced feminine energy right about now. The rest of us, i.e. voters, many of us are women. And for those not residing in that “special place in hell” spoken of by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, we have our work cut out for us. But we’ve been there before. And we know what to do.

~Blessed be our constitutionally protected right to vote!