Tuesday, January 25, 2005

The 2004 Presidential Election 5-Step Grieving Process

I've gone through my progression of steps dealing with presidential election result. Let's see, what are they again: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance.

Denial - President Bush may have won, but they couldn't pull it off without resorting to every dirty cheat in the book. For a while, I was in the denial stage -- hoping that the massive army of blogging fact checkers would unearth some evidence of massive, systemic fraud. Of course, when you privatize the vote, and allow companies run by partisan CEOs to handle the election results, you can never be sure. I haven't even begun to discuss the massive levels of voter disenfranchisement - improper allocation of voting resources, with long lines in predominately black neighborhoods, compared to start contrast found in white voting distracts. As you can see, I haven't really gotten past the denial stage, and I probably never will.

Anger - I have a whole lot of anger left in me, and it isn't going away any time soon. There is nothing like the wrath of righteous indignation to motivate oneself to continue onward in the fight for justice, peace, tolerance, and equalilty in this world.

Bargaining - I watched Fahrenheit 9/11 again the other day. The scene involving the attempted contest of the 2000 Presidential Election by the congressional black caucus was too much for me to bear, as I wallowed in the misery, almost brought to tears. If only we had contested the election in 2000. Why, Al Gore, did you instruct every democratic senator to ignore their duty to defend the rights of this citizens of this great nation. The pain and suffering that we could have avoided. The years of progress that have been destroyed by this foul administration.

Depression - Reflecting on what might have been quickly led me to a short, but heart felt depression. Quickly realizing that sulking in my own misery can do no good, I was emboldened to move on to the final stage of the grieving process.

Acceptance - I finally accepted, that despite the fact that the 2000 and 2004 US presidential elections combined could be considered the greatest farce in modern political history, we are stuck with this administration for another four years. I can now say that I have never felt more motivated in my life to become a political activist - a champion for the rights of the little person. The question I asked myself is "How did this happen? -- How did the Bush Administration, saddled with a first term of incompetence, gross, nearly criminal negligence, disregard for the most basic levels of decency -- How did they win? Despite everything that is going on, a very slim majority of Americans were somehow convinced that everything was alright.

As Michael Moore put it in the beginning of Fahrenheit 9/11, when discussing the 2000 election, "Was it all just a dream??" Well folks, this is deja vu all over again. We have four more years to point our fingers at everything the Bush Administration is doing wrong. Four more years to convince the population of this once great nation of how things could be better. Four more years to bring the progressive voice into the mainstream of American consciousness. Four more years....It isn't a futile effort. Keep up the fight, stay motivated, and press back the Bush Administration's attacks on our nation's civil rights and what is left of our progressive policies. Eventually the nightmare will end...I mean, it has to stop sometime....Doesn't it?

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