Unplug Your Kids

This is not a blog about politics. I wish this blog to be a forum that draws together diverse people with a common interest, rather than yet another polarizing political website.

I hope that with this post, I am not committing blog suicide and ruining what I have attempted to build over the last year and a half that Unplug Your Kids has been in existence.

The other day my husband pointed out to me as I was ranting to him about politics, that if I truly care what happens in the upcoming U.S. Presidential Election (and I most certainly DO care), then I am under a moral obligation to publicly state my opinion.

Eeek!! MY opinion? My POLITICAL opinion? State it PUBLICLY?? But I am the world’s biggest non-confrontational human being! What if no one LIKES me anymore??

Once I got over this childish first reaction, I thought and thought about my husband’s remark. I even ran it by both my sister and my good friend Wishy. I have come to the conclusion that he is right, although I hate to admit it! I must be brave and speak my mind.

I am voting for Barack Obama. There, I said it.

For the first time ever, I feel like I am voting for someone and not against someone.

My reasons? I have both left-brained intellectual reasons and right-brained very personal, emotional ones.

Let’s start with my left-brain:

• Change: I believe that the United States is in a terrible mess after the last 8 years, both domestically and internationally. Therefore, we need a change. A BIG CHANGE.

Another Republican administration might do things a bit differently from the present one. Who knows? To me however, John McCain’s views on “change” appear to be vague and constantly shifting as he adjusts his plans to what he thinks voters want to hear. Logically, dramatic change is far more likely with a complete political shift.

• Education: Obama supports increased funding of all levels of education as well as the creation of well-funded programs for pre-K children. Fix the schools themselves, don’t just shuffle kids from bad public schools to good ones. His focus is on recruiting and retaining high quality teachers, which of course means paying them more.

I also like this: “This isn’t just another education debate where the answer lies somewhere between more money and less bureaucracy. It’s a responsibility that begins at home - one that we need to take on before our kids ever step foot in a classroom; one that we need to carry through well into their teenage years.”

And obviously I like this too: “Parents will need to make sure their kids turn off the TV once in a while, and put away the video games, and start hitting the books.”

Here, here!

• Energy: Obama’s focus is on becoming energy independent. McCain emphasizes more domestic drilling for oil.

There are many reasons I don’t like the proposal to increase oil drilling, but one important fact to keep in mind is that drilling today will not magically bring down the prices at the pump tomorrow. In 20 years we might see an effect (“The U.S. Department of Energy’s own Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimates that even twenty years down the road, when Arctic Refuge oil is at or near peak production, gas prices would be affected by about a penny per gallon”), but think of all we can achieve in 20 years to reduce our dependence on ALL oil (not just “foreign” oil) with proper incentives and a clear plan.

Plus: I seem to recall learning in grade school that oil is a finite resource. It will run out eventually!

• Foreign Policy: I find the current U.S. foreign policy behavior to be embarrassingly insular and arrogant. I believe an Obama presidency would bring more openness and willingness to talk to both allies and others. I believe that his administration would encourage a more global and culturally-sensitive mindset.

And finally, my right-brain (caution, very personal stuff ahead):

• Sarah Palin: Terrifying. I disagree with every one of her opinions (at least those that she has been able to successfully articulate). If she became President I would have to pack up and move to Antarctica.

I find the following extremely disturbing:

• Rape: During Sarah Palin’s time as mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, the town began charging rape victims for rape kits and exams. Isn’t that like charging a murder victim’s family for investigation of a murder scene? Doesn’t it discourage women from coming forward for help when raped? This New York Times editorial says it better than I can.

Sarah Palin opposes abortion even in cases of rape and incest. For most women, this is a hypothetical issue. How do we think we would feel if we became pregnant as a result of incest or rape?

My sister (who urged me to share her story publicly in this post) has had close personal experience with such a situation.

On the way to her car one night during medical school, she was dragged into the bushes at knife point and raped. She says that if a pregnancy had resulted from her rape and she was denied an abortion, she would have killed herself. She knows how she felt.

Perhaps not all of us would react the way my sister did. However, there is a chance that some women who believe they would choose to continue such a pregnancy to term, might actually find that they feel differently after having been dragged off and raped.

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This is just a very small piece of my thinking on just a few of the issues.

Obviously there is so much more to the campaigns, so please head over to Barak Obama’s website and also John McCain’s to do your homework. It is REALLY important.

Since, as I stated earlier, I don’t wish this blog to be about politics and I don’t want my comments section to be a flaming venue for anger and political debate, I have decided to close comments on this post.

If you disliked or disagreed with this post, or feel that it was in anyway inappropriate, then I urge you to simply ignore it and come back tomorrow for more books, crafts and TV-free living. If you have a blog and feel like explaining who you support and why, there is always that option too.

I’ll still like you even if you vote for McCain, and I hope you’ll like me even though I support Barack Obama!

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A few speeches that I find really inspiring! (And that seem to be relevant to the themes of Unplug Your Kids):

• Obama to the American Library Association (June 27, 2005)
• Strengthening Families in a New Economy, (June 15, 2007)
• Real Leadership for a Clean Energy Future (October 8, 2007)
• Our Kids, Our Future (November 20, 2007)

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