Four more years. That is what is on every one's minds, lips and facebooks. Right, left or dissatisfied? No matter what side you are on, you can always find a trendy article to post on your timeline to show everyone how very educated and politically responsible you are.
It's the time of year the gloves come off and we start insult our friends and family for their inability to grasp the truths that are so obvious to us, or their tired indifference. Instead of posting things about why our candidate represents what we believe, we undermine what others value "I can't believe people can watch this and still vote for Obama!!! Let's take America back people!" and "Mitt Romney is rich! All politicians should be poor!!"
To all my friends on the left-I get it, you don't like corporations. I hate wal-mart too, but sometimes convenience really is worth it. All the food that is killing you isn't being shoved down your throat while a gun is pointed at your head. I'll tell you I'm all in favor of local and organic food, and while I'm not a fan of chemicals added to my everyday food, I think the preservatives added to my diet coke are less dangerous than living a hundred years ago before modern medicine.
...life expectancy rose dramatically in the United States over the past century. Final data for 2003 (the most recent available) show that life expectancy at birth for the total population has reached an all-time American high level, 77.5 years, up from 49.2 years at the turn of the 20th century
The government and corporations aren't poisoning us, progress just comes at a price.
To those on the right, especially the christian ones-I'm pretty sure the bible has a few things to say about honoring all authority, not just the ones you like (1 Peter 2:13-17). If you can't give your opinions in a way that is not disrespectful, please take the "christian" off of your "christian conservative" label.
I myself vote for the GOP and align myself with their values and most policies. However, loudly voicing your distaste for the "welfare state" while gassing up your mini-van is a little obnoxious. Sending twenty dollars a month to a poor child in Africa is hardly charity when you think nothing of spending three times that amount on a haircut.
Also, to the ones that scream "don't raise my taxes!!"-do you drive your car on a road that was paved by taxes? Go to a school funded by state and federal taxes? Check out material at a library? Spend time at the park? We are also in a war, by the way. Not all taxes are bad, and if you use it you should pay for it (King George was taking out stuff and taxing us, not the same thing).
From where I stand, the problem is not in the politicians in Washington, but in ourselves. If we find it so difficult to find common ground with our friends and families, people we love and care about, why do we expect it from those we elect? We feel unrepresented as "the little people", when we are actually being represented exactly as we are.
So go ahead, blame the right wing agenda and the liberal media for the problems in America, heap accusations on the president and corporations for everything wrong in country...because in a nation "for the people, by the people" it can be a little awkward to find the one to blame in the mirror.
In the middle, I'm a conservative that cares about the poor, doesn't believe that every homeless person is a hopeless drug addict and opposes the death penalty. I believe that abortion is murder, states should be "Free and Independent" and that the government has overstepped it's bounds in a tragic way.
But mostly, I believe in this country, and I believe in these people.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed....
YouTube didn't exist, but your parents probably had one of these: 
Worms. Not just any worms, big fat nightcrawlers. So big you have to pinch them in half, getting their insides spurted on you before sliding them on the hook. 
I am far from home, in south middle Tennessee-again, spending time with Kadee, my best friend. In one afternoon and two evenings we caught upwards of 45 little pan fish-mostly blue gill. However, there were two bass that we cleaned and cooked up! 
I do not drive in the mountains. At least, Kadee does not allow me to at night....
Today we stopped by the farm near where Kadee grew up, and then we are on our way to the Dinosaur Museum! Kadee and I both had a stage growing up where we wanted to be paleontologists, so its the perfect place to end our stay in St. George.
