On Politics

I love to hear what people think about various topics in politico. As someone who was raised in an extremely liberal political environment with hippie parents/step-parents and total absence of religion, I have a lot of sympathy for the left. The left is often accused of being "immoral" by the right and the right doesn't understand how this godless, unmotivated and shifty crowd of criminal illegal-immigrant loving city-dwellers can justify their existence. I find this to be simply untrue--many liberals are religious but private about it. Many liberals are also among the most educated in the nation so the unmotivated bit doesn't seem to apply unless we are classifying higher education as for the unmotivated and lazy? Also most liberals belief in reform, change, and giving a hand to the needy as education can change the cycles of poverty and violence which is why they are more likely to stick with a local school and give it a try to help change the larger system.

As someone who belongs to a church with reportedly high numbers of republicans (Utah is the only state where Clinton came in third) I also am sympathetic to the right. The "liberal media" and Hollywood types accuse the right as being uneducated, greedy, and uncaring about the plight of the poor. This is also untrue. Republicans give a much larger percentage of their time and salary to charitable causes than do Democrats--by some astounding numbers even. The accusation of greedy in that case is untrue and in fact most Republicans are not looking out for "big business" but "small business" owners as the right is very protective of the ideals of the American Dream. This does not make them greedy but hopeful. As for the uncaring about the plight of the poor, they are really much more involved in trying to create laws to protect the poor according to their own ideals.

Both parties have some ugly pundits--Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter--who are funny, but irreverently unkind. The right have Bill Maher and Jon Stewart who both have great comedic timing but say some pretty offensive things as well.

Both parties have some heroes in history and currently who do amazing things for mankind and are trying to change the world in their own way.

I want to coexist peacefully so in the blogosphere I tend to keep a low profile. I like to summarize my political views by sharing a conversation a group of students had about me a few years ago:

Student 1: "Come on Ms. Fleming, who are you going to vote for?"

Flem: "I do not share my political views as I want you to develop your own ideas about politics without my influence."

Student 2: "But just tell us--we won't tell anyone."

Flem: Silence

Student 1: "She is a democrat. All teachers are."

Student 2: "But she is a Mormon! All Mormons are republicans."

Student 3: "Ahhh! What are you?"

Flem: Silence

If you can't tell, I won't tell.