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Chatterbox: A vote in time

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Election Day is coming and voting is a great privilege denied to many. It’s imperative that we the people vote as objectively and wisely as we can for unity, strength and justice across the board.

We all know many candidates have a stand and commitments to their political position and their donors. Whether seeking a new position or running to retain the seat they want as theirs for life, candidates share their views, cautiously, as edited by them or their competition.

Before voting, we must look intensely at what’s happening in this country, determine what we independently believe and, more importantly, what we want this nation to be. We must be strongly introspective about what this nation requires to be to be the strongest it can be, not just what serves us singularly. To vote to give our nation the resources, freedoms and opportunity needed to enrich the entire nation, we must decide for ourselves which political choice will get us there. We must think and vote not to serve us, but to enrich this country as one whole population created from many unique peoples, tapping the prospects of all.

We’ve already discussed why candidates push certain legislation, why, who they owe, their personal pursuits, divide and conquer tactics, and getting the whole truth for ourselves because many news sources edit the facts. One ad I’ve seen says, “he’ll raise taxes.” They didn’t mention “for millionaires.”

We must ask ourselves which America we want to live in. There are several. Do we want to live in the nation we are now just pretending to be, that “truly free” one? The words of the Declaration of Independence were written to tell a king what his subjects believed they should have … or was that truly meant for the entirety of a new nation? Except for America’s native tribes, none of us really belongs on this land. Was havoc wrecked on them and a revolution fought only to recreate the class system our revolutionaries were trying to escape? Do we allow America to belong to certain privileged people? Who? And who chooses those people?

We can’t be a strong nation if we deny the strength in our diversity. Few Americans would be willing to give up all we’ve gained from our great diversity – agricultural advancements, vaccines, surgical procedures, manufacturing and education.

We must remember what was prevented or gained from the sacrifices of our American soldiers – all diverse servicemen and women. We never hesitated to be inclusive when recruiting for a war to fight. We can’t hesitate to be inclusive with what benefits everyone either. They of all heritages didn’t risk or sacrifice their life for something that was covertly for the few. Either America’s broad stripes and bright stars, which we so proudly hailed, still wave over the land of the free and the home of the brave, or they don’t. Are only some free?

We pledge allegiance to the flag of one united nation, one single entity not crippled by division, not serving the few or protecting the privileged; “liberty and justice for all” means all – or, it was supposed to. No one prospers well in an America perpetuating discrimination.

We vote for America to demonstrate to the world that what we say isn’t just words, pretending to be a united nation where all people are created equal. We must commit: All men are created equal or they’re not – or are only all white men created equal, or all men whose families came before 1900, or 1800, or only those of some religions, and what about women? Who are the chosen ones?

Hard truth: No one has more of a birth right than anyone else when speaking of the long line of strangers who made a home in a nation belonging to only an indigenous people. So, if we aren’t a member of an indigenous tribe, we either welcome all, or none. A functioning immigration process would help greatly. We used to have one. Let’s vote on that sometime soon, too.

Before we vote, we need to ask ourselves who Americans are, what we want from – and for – this nation, and what this land must offer everyone if we want it to offer it to us, because nothing makes any of us more entitled than another. Most of us, or our ancestors, came with the same hope.

This election, though nonpresidential, is still critical for this nation’s unity or calamity. We must be careful whom we empower.


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