Reply #7: I don't mean to sound pessimistic, but a few things have happened

[beachmom]

that have put me in despair. First off, I was behind reading my local newspaper, and delved through it the last few days. Locally, nobody seems to think the NSA wiretapping story was that big a deal (!!??). All the fury is against the leaker (whistleblower, is more like it). And then I went out to dinner with some of my friends, and just the stuff they talked about was either not about politics or showed how they only care about themselves, not the poor or even soldiers or the war, and NOTHING was mentioned about the fact that * had broken the law. Everybody talked about decorating their house, scrapbooking, and other insanely boring things (to me, anyway), when meanwhile, we find out spooks might have been reading our e-mails!! I went home feeling very empty inside, like all that is important to me is largely irrelevant to most people around here.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't there more conservatives than liberals in this country, so a Dem will never have the luxury of pandering to their base, because they MUST reach out to swing voters. The thing that bugs me is that people I know who are not "wingnuts", but who do vote, just do NOT have the same values as me. They really don't care about OTHER people not having health insurance or how poverty keeps going up or that our soldiers are dying as we sit eating our nice dinner. They don't think about it and they DON'T CARE. They have voted and will continue to vote for their own interests -- that is IMMEDIATE interests. In other words, they hear about this NSA story, and think that it's good to eavesdrop on terrorists; ONLY if they learn that someone they know or their own rights have been directly violated would they even think differently about it. They don't CARE about what's in the U.S. Constitution or what the founding fathers wanted. They just want to be free to go out and buy MORE STUFF and catch the latest reality TV show. If a Democrat speaks "tough", but doesn't directly tell a voter "what's in it for me", then we're doomed. People just don't give a shit. They really don't. THAT'S why they didn't vote for Kerry -- because he was pleading for them to think outside the usual materialistic, selfish box, and they just didn't want to. So they voted for *. I don't know how to change this mentality. Maybe someone can give me a pep talk and try to get me out of this pessimism. But after this week, I have NO faith in voters to do the right thing. They're hopelessly selfish, and if it means that the country goes down the toilet, well, that'll be their children's or grandchildren's problem, not theirs.

That's my report from red country.