And so we elect them again and again . . .

Several months ago the Democratic Party of Arizona sent me an email asking what I would like to see in the Democratic Platform for this election.

My short answer was: A backbone.

I would like to see our nation's leader have the strength of character to stand up to the Religious Right and tell them it is none of their business who or what someone believes in, if at all. Furthermore, they are free to practice their religion only so long as it does not conflict with the freedom and welfare of others. Just as freedom of speech does not include the freedom to yell "fire" in a crowded building, freedom of religion does not include the freedom to exploit or abuse others, or to force others to follow the dictates of their beliefs.

I would like to see them take the firm stance that marriage is a civil contract. It is a public declaration that two people have formed a partnership to deal with the day to day issues of survival, give assistance to each other during times of hardship, and share the responsibilities of raising any children that may result. As such it doesn't matter if the partners are a man and a woman, two men, two women or any combination of the above. As long as both, or all, partners have entered the agreement freely and knowingly without being coerced or forced to do so then they are married. If you wish to bring religion into it that is your and your partner's decision, and those complications are of your own devising and have nothing to do with me.

I would like to see the Democrats finally have the courage to declare that in a nation as rich as the United States there is no justifiable reason every man, woman and child is not provided with the best medical treatment in existence. For a fraction of what we have spent getting our youth killed in Iraq we could have given every citizen, or alien, state of the art medical aide. (In the long run it would have even saved the nation billions of dollars by preventing hundreds of thousands of conditions from becoming even worse, and therefore more costly, or perhaps even occurring at all.)

I would like to see the Democrats finally state publicly and without apology that all of the hysteria over illegal aliens is nothing more than disgustingly shameful bigotry and racism. Unless you are 100% Native American or First Nation you or your family probably got here without a visa. Whenever the immigration authorities, or our publicity addicted sheriff, make a sweep rounding up the 'illegals' they are caught working in restaurants, construction sites or doing some other bottom rung job no 'citizen' would take. They are working. The drug dealers and thieves responsible for our high crime rate are our own, home grown product. The woman with six children from six different fathers draining our welfare system is a citizen and not one of those filthy wetbacks.

There's more. So much more.

秋風や石積んだ馬の動かざる

Autumn wind/A horse loaded with stones/Doesn't move