The New Years Dream/ Avenger Rabbit

The New Years’ Dream…

By Avenger Rabbit

I had a dream. And it was a good dream.
I dreamed that the last five years was erased.
I was cast into a time before the 2000 elections cast their pall over everything.

And it helped me to imagine what this would be like. I began imagining what would have happened had Jeb not been governor. Then I started to think about what might have happened had the two conservative justices reclused themselves because of their affiliation with the Party.

I was on a roll.

Then I started thinking about what would have happened had Bill and Al patched things up and that Al then didn’t need Lieberman for Vice President. Then I went further. I imagined that Florida did not dump 55,000 eligible minority voters from the voter roles; that foreigners were not threatened at the polls; or encouraged to go to other polls; and that there was somebody there to answer their questions and help them vote.

I imagined that the overseas mail for Bush was not expedited nor rubber-stamped; nor the absentee votes for Gore tossed; that the voting machines in democratic strongholds were maintained and there was no such thing as hanging chads. Imagine how different things might be today if any of those things had come to pass.

What would our lives be I wondered?

No question, Newt Gingrich had laid the foundation for a Republican take-over that has proved as bloody as any civil war except that it has been fought out not for geography or for natural resources, but for power and control. Power and control to run anything and everything with complete freedom from checks and balances.

If Gore had been president as deserved to be, would any of this have happened?. No, not even in our wildest dreams.

Never were two candidates so dramatically opposite. Bush a product of noble obliges was plenty of noble but no so much in the obliges department. In fact, he always felt that everything he got, he deserved. That takes a special kind of mind set that obviates humility, gratitude and compassion and simply tosses it out of one’s vocabulary. Here is a special mix of selfishness, egotism and hubris and disdain for others.. Gore, on the other hand, believed he was brought up to serve. Who was taught that governing for the people was the highest good that one could ascribe to.

Ask yourself would he have dug up the pristine Arctic for a few barrels of oil instead of legislating conservation? Of course not! Would he have waged a war against Saddam to settle an old grudge? Would Gore have demanded more power for the Executive?
Of course not, he believed in the division of power; he wouldn’t have worked to destroy some of the basic constructs our nation was built on. Would he have blown away our surplus giving tax breaks to the already rich? No! Would Gore have eliminated our freedoms while creating something like the Patriots Act which gives the government implicit rights to snoop on other Americans? You know he wouldn’t. He was too much of a believer in the Constitution and what it stood for to believe that a president should jettison it for the sake of self interest.

Would he have postponed the Clean Air and Clean Water acts? Would he not have been a signatory to the Kyoto Accords? Would he allow species to be threatened; would he have allowed logging trails to despoil our great untouched wilderness areas?

Gore stood against these mindless acts. He stood for progress. He stood for recyclable products that did not poison the atmosphere or emit toxins when used. He supported technology for only one reason: To make the world a better place.

Now, let’s contrast that with all that GWB had done in six years in office for the average citizen: Zero!

That’s right, this man who has penultimate power has done literally nothing to improve the lot of the poor—in fact, he has acted to impede the less fortunate even more. He has done nothing to help seniors beset with medical and drug costs. He has done nothing to improve the schools. He has done nothing for the inner cities. . He has done nothing to kick-start business, create decent jobs, or move those on the lowest rungs of the economic ladder up even one rung.

On the other hand, he has helped the rich get richer. He has helped business avoid paying decent wages; send their better jobs ‘off-shore and he has helped put the finishing touches on American industry. We don’t even have a machine tool industry any more and can barely produce bearings needed by virtually every machine. He has helped his oil friends fill their coffers from oil profits; and he has made it impossible for the average person to pay to his growing fuel costs. Overall, he has contributed to the redistribution of wealth so that now 5% of the population controls more than 60% of the country’s wealth. He has turned us into a debtor nation, a colony among nations, owned by China, Japan, England and Saudi Arabia—a nation that has more enemies and fewer friends than any nation on earth. And he has helped us go from the world’s leading democracy to a monarchy reminiscent of the French government before the Revolution. Just imagine what he might do in the next three years?

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