On Not Taking the Bad With the Good

*Tom was an alcoholic and a smoker.  A master carpenter and sometimes-roofer, he was wiry and tough and a living old-school ad for both Budweiser and Marlboro.

From time to time, usually at the urging of his family, Tom would stop drinking for a while, or stop smoking for a while, or stop both, for a while.  At a point in his late 30s he decided and voiced that he’d rather live a short life with his beer & cigs than live a long life without them.  When he entered the hospital at age 43, his body riddled with cancer, he did not complain or blame or mourn.  He knew why he was there and he was at peace with it.

We all do this to a certain extent: put up with some bad if it is outweighed by some good.  Drinkers put up with hangovers because they enjoy the drunk more than they dislike the hangover.  Pot smokers live with coughing their lungs out when they invariably take too big a hit, but decide it is worth it for the buzz.  Obese people enjoy the third bowl of ice cream and bag of chips more than they dislike buying bigger clothes each year.

And so it goes.

We also do this when we vote.

President Trump

Regardless of any other issue, Joey will vote for any gubernatorial candidate that will support legalizing pot in his state.  Soccer Mom will vote for the candidate that campaigns on better funding for schools and Christian Dad will vote for candidates he feels has ‘good values’.  We are selfish.  We want what’s good for us and our family.  Sometimes it can go too far.

Soccer Mom will vote for the candidate that campaigns on better funding for schools and Christian Dad will vote for candidates he feels has ‘good values’.  We are selfish.”

Is it really worth it America, having an openly racist and misogynistic president; one that mocks the disabled and students and children, just so you can feel that your ‘right’ to own and brandish an AK47 won’t be threatened?

Is it really worth it America, having a president about whom you know that almost everything that comes out of his mouth is pure BS, just do you can now – following his example – feel good about your racism?

Is it really worth it America, having a president that bootlicks every communist leader he can find while alienating leaders in almost every other country in the world including our most powerful allies, just so you can vicariously flip off Obama?

Is it really worth it America, having a president who will go down in history as the person that more than any other single person or nation caused/hastened the planet’s upcoming climate woes, just so you can continue to drive your kids to school in a truck that gets 8 MPG?

Is it really worth it America, having a president so vindictive, so childish, so hateful, so insecure that I am fearful that having this piece posted could result in retribution for exercising my right to call a liar a liar and a hideous man a hideous man?  As noted when this was submitted, it already feels like we live in Nazi Germany.

This is serious people.  He is not only making a joke of the Constitution and threatening our very democracy – he is ruining the damn planet!  2020 is the year to not be selfish and not be short-sighted and not vote for this hideous man again.

The Democrats are doing a horrible job.  The DNC is and has been run by inept people; people that aren’t paying attention or know how to use a computer or have ANY idea of who they are up against.  It seems like it will be a miracle if they can field a viable candidate – one that isn’t too old or too white or too obtuse.  But it is a good bet that whoever they come up with won’t mock the disabled or grab unknown women’s vaginas and brag about it or abuse his power or lie, lie, lie, lie, lie – and that means that they will be more deserving of your vote.

It is time to think about America and its future and the planet and its future and vote not for your gun or your prejudice or your ATV but for the future.  Vote so that your kids and your grandkids will have a healthy planet to live on and a still-democratic nation to live in.  Vote to remove Trump; too much depends on it.

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Reeno

–  REENO  –

A graduate of Portland State University, Steve Kloser is the author of Beginning Band – A Guide to Success. Accomplished teacher, conductor, composer web developer, Packers Fan, and Proud American, Reeno’s usually slanted outlook often presents an unlikely perspective on old and new. He currently lives on the Portland, OR area.

Catch Steve on Twitter

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A graduate of Portland State University, Steve Kloser is the author of “Beginning Band - A Guide to Success” and “Let's Make Music - Classroom Recorder Course”.
He is also an accomplished teacher, conductor and composer, having penned numerous pieces including: La Vida and Fly With Me.
Teacher, web developer, Packers fan and proud American, Reeno's usually slanted outlook often presents an unlikely perspective on issues old and new. Reeno currently lives in Portland, OR.
Read more at www.reeno317.me or follow Reeno on Twitter at https://twitter.com/portlandreeno.

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