Marc Perkel Rantz

What is this Election About?

What is this election about - or more importantly - who is going to decide what this election is about? Well - the answer to the second part of the question is - we are! We have to control the "What is this election about ?" question! Therefore - we need to do two things - define what this election is about - including what this election is not about - and we need to figure out how to make it about what we want to make it about.

Again - answering the second question first - the way we control what this election is about is that we hammer it on our web site - over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.

Then - we figure out what the election is and is not about.

This Election is NOT about

The election is not about a referendum on gay marriage. If we are talking about gay marriage then we are not talking about what this election is about. Not to say that gay marriage isn't an important issue - but it certainly is not important compared to the economy, the war in iraq, the patriot act, freedom and liberty issues, the raping of America, and the fact that America can't survive another 4 years of Bush.

The election is not about Bush's service - or lack thereof - in the national guard. Yes - he was AWOL - and we all know that. But that debate is a distraction. It distracts from Bush being AWOL as president allowing 9-11 to happen while he was in Texas being beaten up by a pretzel.

And - this election is not about anything the Republicans want to say the election is about. If we are talking about their issues - then we aren't talking about our issues. We need to make sure that when the Republican owned media tries to control the debate and define the election on their terms that we show them down and make sure we are dominate - whatever it takes.

This election is not about Republicans vs. Democrats - not about Liberal vs. Conservatives - not about Christians vs. Heathens - not about the rich vs. the poor - not about workers vs. corporations - not about this group vs. that group. There are a lot of things that everyone has in common that this election is about. So we can't let the Bush administration chop America up into little pieces and try to reassemble the pieces into a shape that appears to make it look like a culture war that Bush is the winner of. We can't be distracted into letting them control what the election is about.

What the Election is About - Its about the Future

So - getting down to - what is this election about - I remember Carville defining the debate. "It's the economy stupid!" - and yes - it still is the economy - and the economy sucks and it is not recovering - it is not strong - we are going further in the hole at a faster rate than ever. We are in a nose dive only 2000 feet from the ground and it may already be to late to pull out of it.

However - "It's the economy stupid!" is now a smaller piece of a bigger picture. The big picture is - this election is about THE FUTURE stupid. This election is about tomorrow. We need to ask the question - "What will America be like if we have 4 more years of Bush?" "What kind of Country are we? "Who are we and what have we become".

We need to keep the focus on the future. In fact - that can be a test to see if we are on the right track. If an issue is presented - is the issue about the future - or is it a distraction? I remember in the last real election where Dole talked about a bridge to the past - and Clinton talked about a bridge to the future. You know who won that debate. In my Church of Reality - looking towards the future is known as the "sacred direction" - we are forward looking - onward and upward. Looking to the future is the winning issue in this debate and it is up to us to keep the focus of this election on the future.

So - what kind of a future do we want America to have? Where are we and what direction are we heading? What will America look like in 2008 if Bush is reselected? We can ask the question - "Are you better off than you were 4 years ago?" - but - a better question would be - "Will you be better off 4 years from now with Bush or Kerry?" Clinton understood these issues. He framed the debate between hope and fear. Bush will be pushing fear - we must push hope. Hope by definition is forward looking - to long for a better tomorrow. That's that this election is about - hope - a longing for a better tomorrow.

Who can disagree with that? I mean - if you ask Republican voters - do you want a better tomorrow - 65% of them would say Yes!

So - what will America be like if Bush is reselected? Will we be a nation at war? Will we have the Draft? Will the government be forcing us to give up our children to die in an undeclared war for no reason at all? Will we have any jobs left? Will Bush continue to cut taxes for the rich. Will Head Start exist in 2008? Will there be an education system left? What state economies will collapse? Will the national economy collapse?

What about freedom and liberty? Will Patriot 2 pass? Will there be government spies everywhere - watching your every move? Will we go to jail for writing messages like this one? Will there be any free speech? Will the government drag us off to jail as an enemy combatant if we speak out? Is this the end of freedom if Bush is reselected?

What about the economy? What will happen by 2008? Will we be so far in the hole that we never get out? At what point does the debt collapse the economy? What happens then? Do we start World War 3 using our nuclear weapons to threaten other countries to steal their resources?

Or - are we talking about RATIONING? Rationing is the future under Bush. Allen Greenspan has already given us a glimpse of America's future under Bush. What he advised is RATIONING SOCIAL SECURITY. There's a term for you - rationing social security. That's what this election is about! If we can get that phrase into the national debate then the debate is on our terms. I would love to see the media arguing whether or not we are rationing social security.

But the rationing doesn't stop there. What about Medicare? We won't be able to afford that either. We are going to have to ration Medicare. We are going to have to ration health care. We are going to have to decide that there just isn't enough money to treat everyone who is sick - so we are going to have to decide as a society who gets treatment and who gets to die on the steps of the hospital.

The - will we have rationed education? Or - will the educational system just collapse? Will we become like a third world country where we have a mostly illiterate population? I think that one of the tings we should be asking in this election - when will America catch up to Cuba when it comes to literacy. Cuba has a better educational system than we do and to we have the will to catch up to our Communist neighbor - or are we going to continue to fall behind Cuba?

What about the future of religion in America? Christian think they are taking over the government but getting vouchers and funning federal money through churches - but in reality the opposite is happening. When churches start receiving tax money - then people who tithe will stop tithing and decided that they are tithing through their taxes. This will cause a fundamental shift in church funding as members break the giving habit. Churches will become dependent on the government for money - and then the government will have control over religion.

If a church is taking government money - for example - and the government says - "We require that you turn over your membership information to the IRS if you want to continue to receive funding. And - you are not allowed to reveal what information you turn over on your members to the membership." - what do you think is going to happen? The churches will have the freedom to give up the money if they choose not to participate - but are they going to be able to pay the bills once they get dependent on those funds? But - you say - "that's not REALLY going to happen - is it?" My response is - "The airline industry is already doing it. (Jet Blue) What makes you think they are going to stop there?" When Uncle Sam writes the checks - Uncle Sam calls the shots. So - the future of freedom of religion is threatened under Bush.

What does the future hold for workers rights? Bush has already eliminated overtime pay in favor of corporate interests. Corporate power over the right of the people is shifting as we go back to owing our souls to the company store. The big guys call the shots and we have to bend over and take it. The government isn't going to stand up for the common man - it is going to control the common man. We will live our lives in fear - just like people did under Hitler and Stalin - and the words "Freedom and Liberty" will become mere marketing slogans to get you to buy Chineese goods at WalMart!

What of freedom of the press when the press is becoming a single Republican controlled entity. The FCC continues to allow mergers giving control of the media to a small group of Republican controlled interests. Thats why America spends more money, time, and attention on Clinton's blow job that on figuring out what happened in 9-11 so that we can prevent it from happening again. Its not that the public's interest controls that - it's that the corps that own the media get bigger tax breaks under Republicans that they do under Democrats.

Even elections are fixed in America. This election will be no exception. Our voting machines are rigged to elect Republicans. We have to get 60% of the real vote to win an election - maybe. Elections are going to go away and we need to stop it. I find it extremely disturbing that we are being cheated and the media isn't talking about it. It just goes to show you how we - on the front lines of the internet - the last place where freedom exists - for now - that we must prevail or we shall forever lose our last chance to do so.

We are at a point where our technology can become the tool to enslave us. There is a technology called RFID - Radio Frequency Identifier Chips - currently the size of a grain of rice and getting smaller. These chip can be implanted in anything - including you - and can be used to track every place you go and everything you do. I'm not trying to sound like some nut case about chips in your brain - but this technology is finding its way into more and more products. People are microchiping their kids so that they can be found if abducted. But that same thing can be required of everyone - and we will see the day soon when that is proposed. It won't be just pets and cattle - it will be everyone.

This technology is not going to go away - so we must look to the future and make decisions about it. The technology exists - or soon will exist - to track everyone in the country and know everywhere you go and everything you do. So what will our future be like. Because we have this technology to track everyone everywhere - do we do that? Or - do we treat it like nuclear weapons - we can blow up the planet - but we choose not to do so.

The Bush administration is developing a system called Total Information Awareness (TIA) to do just that. To track everyone everywhere and everything they do. This election is about the future - so I ask the question - what kind of future do we want? Do we want Total Information Awareness or don't we. Personally - I don't want it. But - this is what this election is about and if we don't talk about it - no one will. But there's no doubt in my mind that this will be our future unless we stop it.

We all have a Common Goal

What this election is about is - what is our future going to be like? We have a common goal even with those we disagree with. There is no person - not one - in America who is better off under Bush. Our common future is at stake in this election. We are a nation in decline and we must reverse course. It may already be too late - but if it isn't too late now - it will certainly be too late in 2008. Things are really bad and they are getting worse. And it's not just getting worse for Liberals, Democrats, Gays, and other so called - scum of the earth. Its getting worse for Heterosexual Christian white God fearing family values Bible thumpers as well. We are all in this together and we all have to figure out what really is going on and what is best for all of us.

So - as I stated up front - and I challenge anyone of any religious or political persuasion to debate me on this - isn't the future the most important issue in the election? Isn't this what is really at stake? So - if we are going to have a political debate - if we are going to have a political dialog - lets make the debate and the dialog what this election is really about - lets talk about what is real - and lets talk about the future.

I therefore declare that the theme for this election is - ITS ABOUT THE FUTURE STUPID!

Posted by marc at February 28, 2004 05:30 AM | TrackBack