Almost a year ago, my good friend, Tom “Smitty” Smith gave me a tour of the Texas State Capitol, where he has toiled for decades, working to improve Texas’ environmental laws and prepare the state for the boom in renewable energy we’re experiencing today. The state legislature was not in session and there were red velvet ropes cordoning off the House chamber. He asked me if I’d like to go in and see it and I was surprised. A person who works in the House and knows Smitty passed by and stopped to chat. Smitty asked if we could go in and we were allowed to do so.
First, realize a politician has to earn my respect as I’ve seen so much corruption in my life. That being said, when I stepped through the entry, I felt a strong sense of awe and thought about the history to which this room had been a stage. It was silent then and that just added to the immensity of the feelings that flowed through me. The gentleman who let us in showed several paintings to me and explained their history.
As we stood on the Speaker’s Dais and I looked out over the House floor, Smitty asked if I’d like to sit in the Speaker’s chair. I know it’s just a piece of furniture, but again I felt this immense awe about where I was standing and was glad I had attended a committee hearing, just prior to this and was dressed appropriately.
In case you’re connected to me on social media and wondering why I’m so angry about the events of January 6th, perhaps this explains it a bit. Those chambers in the nation’s Capitol Building have witnessed great Americans doing great things and yes, some crappy Americans doing corrupt things. (I’m looking at you, Ted Cruz & Josh Hawley.) But never had they been misused like they were during the insurrection.
These were the very halls of freedom, hallowed ground of democracy and people were looting, shattering windows, breaking through locked doorways and smearing feces on the floors and walls, while dressed as buffoons.
I am trying to regain my composure but right now I am seething in anger. I want swift justice and severe punishment. This morning, I saw a video of a Capitol policeman screaming in agony as he was being crushed in a doorway by the rioters. He tried in vain to keep them out. I saw a video of a lone black officer being chased up a stairwell by a gang of white rioters and wondered if he got out okay. At least, I know he didn’t die, but another officer did, one that had risked his life in our military, serving in Afghanistan and then returned home to protect the very building violated by these terrorists, dying at their hands.
To my fellow Americans: The rioters represent a small group or vocal troublemakers. However, their voices have been amplified and they have been emboldened by many of us who voted for someone we knew was unfit to be President, because we were afraid of the boogeyman of “socialism,” of losing privilege to which we’d become accustomed, fear or dislike of fellow citizens because we didn’t understand them (LGBTQ citizens, in particular) and the economic fears many of us have, because WE allowed an ill-fated, 40 year experiment in trickle-down economics that destroyed our middle class and our job security. We may have not voted because we didn’t like either candidate. Perhaps we voted for a candidate we knew had zero chance of winning, to “make a point.” Or maybe, just maybe, if we’re really honest with ourselves, we voted the way we did out of bigotry and prejudiced views we haven’t really allowed us to realize that we hold.
In any case, going forward, we have to look at voting as something as sacred as what I felt in the Texas Capitol. We have to hold our politicians and our news and social media sources to a high standard of truth or discard them, as trash.
We just took the Census, so as we draw new legislative boundaries, let’s make sure the deck isn’t being stacked against either party, or any ethnic or religious group, or include any other prejudice against what our society allows openly. Let’s make sure we strengthen voting rights and come up with a secure way to vote either by mail, electronically or in person. Let’s make sure we have plenty of polling places distributed where all of us can easily access them, not concentrated in a way that tilts the table for one party or another. Let’s make Election Day a national holiday so those of lesser means don’t have to decide between money for food and rent or having their voices heard. Once we do that, we will elect a more balanced legislature, able to work to solving our problems and once again allow us to reach for ambitious goals.
The following quote is from a movie and it may seem cheesy to use it, but the words are better than any within me:
from The American President:
“For the last couple of months, Senator Rumson has suggested that being President of this country was, to a certain extent, about character. And although I’ve not been willing to engage in his attacks on me, I have been here three years and three days, and I can tell you without hesitation – being President of this country is entirely about character. For the record, yes, I am a card-carrying member of the ACLU, but the more important question is, why aren’t you, Bob? Now this is an organization whose sole purpose is to defend the Bill of Rights, so it naturally begs the question, why would a Senator, his party’s most powerful spokesman and a candidate for President, choose to reject upholding the Constitution?”(Looking at you again, Ted Cruz)Now if you can answer that question, folks, then you’re smarter than I am, because I didn’t understand it until a few hours ago.America isn’t easy. America is advanced citizenship. You’ve gotta want it bad, ’cause it’s gonna put up a fight. It’s gonna say, “You want free speech? Let’s see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who’s standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours.” You want to claim this land as the land of the free? Then the symbol of your country cannot just be a flag. The symbol also has to be one of its citizens exercising his right to burn that flag in protest. Now show me that, defend that, celebrate that in your classrooms. Then, you can stand up and sing about the land of the free.I’ve known Bob Rumson for years, and I’ve been operating under the assumption that the reason Bob devotes so much time and energy to shouting at the rain was that he simply didn’t get it. Well, I was wrong. Bob’s problem isn’t that he doesn’t get it. Bob’s problem is that he can’t sell it! We have serious problems to solve, and we need serious people to solve them. And whatever your particular problem is, I promise you, Bob Rumson is not the least bit interested in solving it. He is interested in two things, and two things only: making you afraid of it, and telling you who’s to blame for it. That, ladies and gentlemen, is how you win elections. You gather a group of middle age, middle class, middle income voters who remember with longing an easier time, and you talk to them about family, and American values and character, and you wave an old photo of the President’s girlfriend and you scream about patriotism.“
