Wow. In one ill-fated evening, I've been thrown back to how I felt on November 4, 2004.
So, I guess I'll be firing up the ol' tractor and heading out into the back 40.
I'm going to be cross-posting on my "Price of Right" Facebook page as well, but I think a blog is right for what's going on right now. I'm not going to inundate my friends and family with my opinions who don't really want to hear political stuff or who want to come over and argue. I'll continue to post music and cat stuff on my regular Facebook page. On this page, I am preaching to the choir.
So I invite you to join me here!
The following is the first post up on Price of Right:
Last night, like many of you, I was in total shock. I love you all
for coming by and sharing your own thoughts and feelings with me, and
for your support. I have a lot more to say, and right now I only want to
say it to you.
The main reason I wrote my book "The Price of
Right" was really to answer my own question, which is why people support
ideologies and policies which go against their own best interests. I
knew why rich people supported the conservative ideology, but why in the
hell did working people support these ideas that had an adverse affect
upon them?
I learned several things on that journey.
I learned that facts don't matter.
I also learned that people have deep psychological - and physical, or
genetically-based - reasons for thinking the way they do, and that when
you hold a position like that, it is not going to be swayed by logic or
argument. So I quit arguing and trying to convince other people to
change their minds. People occasionally do, but not because someone
out-argued them on a blog or Facebook post.
Instead, I decided
to focus on reaching out to the people who share the belief system I do,
and hoping to empower and encourage each other. Yes, I'm 'in the
bubble'. I'm in the 'echo chamber'. I'm not going to expend my energy
and emotion on people who my thoughts and feeliings are just going to
antagonize. And so, here, I'm not having people come shit on me and my
friends. There will be deleted comments and unfriending if necessary.
Being 'public' doesn't mean you get the right to come in and trash the
joint. This is my home, and I'm running it.
Even in spite of how
devastated I am because of last night's catastrophic events, I still
believe that there is strength and power in coming together and working
for progress and positive change - even if we don't see the results in
our lifetime. We fight because it's right, not because we think we're
going to get our way. I believe this more than ever, even if I don't
'feel' it right now.
It was, in fact, a day much like today - the
waking nightmare after a gruesome election - that gave me the impetus
to begin writing my blog "Last Left Turn Before Hooterville". I woke up
the day after the second Bush election in 2004 and I couldn't get out of
bed. I couldn't believe that after the previous four years he was still
in the White House. I experienced a profound sense of disorientation. I
didn't know where to turn or what to do.
I had never written
before in my life, but I felt, like I feel now, that it was 'write or
die'. I started reading the comments on the Washington Post political
site, and got into a conversation with a guy who had his own political
blog. I went over there and for the first time felt like there were
people who thought the way I did and wanted to talk about it. So I
started my own blog. And that blog led me to a whole world of
progressive thought and progressive friends - and even a book contract!
I feel so lucky that I was able to have a platform to write exactly
what I wanted to say.
So I invite you, my friends and loved ones, over here to chat with me - share some solidarity and hope, and channel our anger and frustration into action.
And fuck those motherfuckers.
Here is a link to the very first post I wrote on my Hooterville blog.
It takes me back so viscerally to the way I felt then, which is the way I
feel again now. And I would take a thousand Dubyas over the
monster that has just bullied his way into the presidency.
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