Day 31 - Politik

I apologize in advance to my dyed-in-the-wool Republican readers and friends. But knowing me, you knew this would happen. So seriously, just stop reading right here. I'm going to speak freely. You might not like it. And p.s. I still love you, I just don't love what you do.

Sooo, I thought when I moved to California I'd be free from these pointless "discussions" with conservatives. You see, I'm from North Dakota, a state that runs pure blood red year after election year. I've heard earfuls of thinly-veiled racist twang from the good ol' boys who like to hunt and fish; the ones that damn sure don't want any free-lovin' lazy liberals to get their hands on their hard-earned tax dollars. No sirree. And stay away from their guns or they'll shoot ya.

Then I moved to Arizona, where a whole nother brand of Republicans paints the desert red. They're the mock intellectual religious zealots--the Mormons, Evangelicals, Jehovah's. They view their ballot not as a choice between two candidates, but rather as a decision between God and eternal damnation. These mostly college-educated suburbanites LOVE to patiently have "discussions" with you with their completely unresearched information that was hand-fed to them straight out of the pastor's mouth.

This conversation is a complete and utter waste of time (trust me, I've had it more times than I can count). They've got eternal life on their side remember? They surely won't listen to your devilish Democrat ways (or your facts for that matter), I mean seriously, their pastor warned them about you.

And I'm not saying I have anything against their religious choices. In fact, most of them are better because of it. And some are just downright the loveliest people I've ever met. But I just don't see why Religious and Republican are so intertwined. It's antithetical.

Anyway, so I finally live in a blue state through and through--my first time EVER living in a Democrat state--and here I am, today, having another one of this circular conversations. Ugh.

And let's be clear: I am not anti "Republicans," per se. That's just semantics. I don't care what you call it. The bottom line for me is: I really just do not understand, for the life of me, no matter how many times I try to think it through, given the overwhelming concrete evidence--I don't get why anyone would vote for George W. Bush (especially the second time) and/or for the McCain-Palin ticket last year.

I just have to believe that you don't read the news. Or you confuse facts with opinions. Most of all, I believe you have a willful aversion to the truth.

So in either cases, my point is, I don't want to "play nice" and try to understand where you're coming from. I've tried and tried and tried, and I can't for the life of me wrap my head around that type of belief system. It's like smashing my head into a brick wall. Over and over again.

It just leaves me flabbergasted and sad. So after this discussion today, I've decided to try to never go there again with my red friends and colleagues. Not in North Dakota, or Arizona, and now California.

They're obviously dead-set against enlightenment ;-). And that's their problem.