Let's Put the Bickering to Bed

My inbox just tweeted "75% of Trump supporters want clean energy!"

That's great, I thought. I bet they also want drinkable water and breathable air.

The next tweet was about an on-air fight between a Clinton organizer and her Trump counterpart. I didn't click on the link because really, who needs more bickering? The photos of both women looked ridiculous, their gaunt cheekbones and threatening pointer fingers sharpened for battle.

I'm tired of bickering, division, and manipulation. Most Americans are, too. We want the same things, for the most part.  Ralph Nader says in the latest issue of The Sun ("It's Easier Than We Think") "We're told that we're a polarized society, right? That's the way the ruling classes have manipulated people for more than two thousand years: divide and conquer" (Issue 492, pg 6).

Nader's quote reminds me of a story in Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States. In the pre-Revolutionary War South, poor whites and poor blacks began to realize how much they had in common. They started to organize against the rich landowners, agitating for higher wages. Let's say, for example, that they were all earning $4/day. They wanted $6/day for everyone. The landowners were spooked by the unity of the uprising and also ticked off because they wanted to keep the money. So they told the poor whites, "We're not giving you $6/day, we're only going to give you $4.50. But it's better than what you had, and it's way better than what we're giving the black folks. They're only getting $3.50."

There was a bit more strategery involved, but the rich landowners drove a wedge between the remarkably similar and united black and white workers. They spent not a penny more, and neither group was better off, but the revolution was still-birthed and division was sowed for future use.

Are we watching it happen again? Everyone's health care has deteriorated over the past decade, everyone's college costs have skyrocketed. Everyone's climate is imperiled. Big majorities in both parties are frustrated by the recent election. We're more alike than we are different.

Who benefits when we spend our time quarreling rather than attacking the big problems? I'll tell you who - the big corporations. They're now allowed to act like people in our democracy. They're allowed to lobby government officials, spend money on campaigns, and support candidates of either or both parties. Some of them are making BIG bucks while we argue about whose supporters are more hate-filled.

This blog simplifies a great deal, I know. Blame it on my cold, on the immense amounts of green phlegm that erupt  when I stop to blow my nose. Blame it on my Friday-night fatigue, or my holiday-tired Mom brain. But when we're done casting blame, let's put the bickering to bed, let's stop being manipulated and let's take on some of the big problems - together.