The elections are next week and I know exactly who I am voting for; but that does not reassure me that the direction of this nation will change.
Over the last few months, I have felt an urge to keep the station tuned to anything regarding Kerry or Bush for a little longer than usual.
But the more I hear, the more I am convinced that neither party is that different from each other.
Ultimately the people in power now and those who will be in power for the next administration are all from the same elite class.
The only hope then to enact real change relevant and in keeping with our needs and those of other nations comes from the people who make up the rest of the population. Experts say this election will turn out more young voters, single women and others who were less likely to vote in 2000. For the past few months, voting has been endorsed by everyone from candidates at rallies to celebrities on Oprah.
But once the election fervor lessens, there will not be anyone there to encourage us to stay involved, and that is when we really need to pay attention. The energy we muster up to vote on Tuesday should remain with us. We should keep this energy so that our voices might be heard after the election frenzy has died down and people stop calling us for surveys; we loose track of what the California legislature is up to; and we forget why we voted in the first place.
So for practice, I am going to try to react to the day after elections as if the race is still on.
We could all pick out three key issues that really got us to question, support or turn against the candidates during the debates and not forget that whoever is in the White House has an obligation to follow through on them. We are going to help them remember if we stay involved, continue to evaluate and, most importantly, respond.
Real change can only come with people’s movements and not politicians with scripted dialogue.
It took the initiative of people in the past to enact change. Factory workers – men, women and children – during the Industrial Revolution banded together before there were unions to strike against intolerable working conditions. The government was not providing reform. Women took to the streets, held rallies and turned militant to guarantee their vote. John Adams disregarded his wife’s plea to not forget the women during the Constitutional Convention. Minority groups marched, died and fought back for change. The Supreme Court answered with the Dred Scott decision and an empty promise of all due deliberate speed in Brown v. Board of Education. The fight continues and new battles emerge daily.
We should also look at issues not being represented by non-voters. For example, should we rely on politicians to decide how schools run best?
No Child Left Behind is wreaking havoc on public schools. President Bush talked up this bill throughout one of the debates even using it to answer questions that had nothing to do with it hoping people would just respond to the ideal sounding phrase.
There is something wrong with blindly supporting legislation when he has never experienced a public school classroom the way an elementary school teacher in El Monte or a parent has.
Bailey Porter, a senior journalism major, is editorial director of the Campus Times. She can be reached by e-mail at porterb@ulv.edu.
