Worried

I feel physically sick, and I have a headache.  It could be what I ate plus what I drank (coffee), but it could also be the election.

I have spent the last few weeks especially trying very hard to keep my mind open - oh, not in terms of who I was voting for, no, no, I was set on that long ago.  Truth be told, the word "socialist" is not dirty to me, and though I don't believe anything Obama has done contributed to socialism in the USA, I would be thrilled if it had.  Having lived in a country with universal health care, I yearn for it.  I have no problem whatsoever with giving more of my income in order to make sure everyone has a basic level of care.  I think a society run purely on capitalistic principles is one where the beating heart is money and only money, and I don't think money makes a good heart for a nation or a person or a philosophy.

BUT - and here's the absolutely headache-inducing problem - I can see why someone else would feel differently.  I can see why someone would say, hey, I worked for this and you have no right to take it to assist someone who hasn't lifted a finger.  That's not how I see the issue, but I do understand a little about the other side, and while I don't agree, I can see some of their points.

These tense, rabid weeks, I have been trying to open my mind up to why the Romney camp believes Romney is the way forward, not because I personally want any of what Romney offers, but because I don't want to dismiss someone who disagrees with me as stupid, or ill-informed, or evil.  It's half the country, folks.  It has to be more complicated than that.

So, here we are.  Down to the wire.  And while I have trouble respecting Romney voters as much as I respected McCain voters (Mitt's constant morphing has made me deeply suspicious of him), I have been trying to do just that.  The problem?  I cannot want him to win. I can't even be ok with the idea of him winning.  I desperately, desperately want Obama to have a second term - and I fully admit I am not a fan of the first term, that I am disappointed in much of what has happened or not happened.  But I don't want ANY of what Romney wants.  More accurately, I don't want any of the Republican platform.  I don't want corporations to be people.  I don't want gays to lose the opportunity to marry.  I don't want an abortion, but I don't want to make abortion illegal, and I don't want any lawmaker taking that choice away from whoever might need to make it.  I don't want the rich to get more tax cuts.  I think Obamacare is going to be painful in part as we figure it out, but I don't want go back to the way things were, I want to try the changes. I don't even want smaller government (*gasp*).

So here, on the eve of the election, I am terrified.  I want a nation that values the things I value, and I am terrified I will wake up in one that has proven with its votes that it does not.

It should go without saying that despite living in a state that everyone knew would overwhelmingly vote for a particular candidate, I voted.  I don't usually write about politics because taking sides shuts you off from an opinion.  Eliminating possible opinions is a two-dimensional place from which to build a character.  Put more simply: you need all sorts of opinions to tell a story, so deciding some opinions are invariably wrong just leaves you poorer.  But tonight I'm a citizen, and I'm scared, and this is what I'm thinking about.

I don't want to live in a corporation.  I hope enough people agree.