Dear Red America,
I want to thank you for all your hard work yesterday. You were looking out for me! And I’m really grateful for that, because I’m usually too busy worrying about other things when I go out and cast my vote. Because that’s just what I do—I worry.
I worry about healthcare, and about the millions of Americans who don’t have access to affordable, quality care, Americans getting dropped from coverage plans, getting denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions, and getting fleeced at the pharmacy when they’re picking up their prescriptions.
I worry about our poor, about the one in four children in this country living below the poverty line and one in five Americans who go to bed hungry every night, and the two million of our homeless who don’t have beds to sleep in.
I worry about our unemployed, about the 19% of us who are out of work or underemployed or who have given up looking entirely, about the 60-year old who’s been laid off and is too unskilled to compete in today’s labor market but too young to retire.
I worry about our small farmers, about the increasing difficulty for small family farms to stay in the family and continue serving a local community, about the increasing corporate seed monopoly that’s being used to bankrupt the individual Americans working our land.
I worry about our homeowners, about families losing their homes to foreclosure and losing their wallets to rising interest rates, about banks getting bailed out after doling out predatory loans and Americans who aren’t given the opportunity to refinance at a reasonable rate.
I worry about our local infrastructure, about our crumbling highways and bridges, about the state and local budgets that are stretched so thin they’re tearing up paved roads because they can’t afford to fill the potholes.
I worry about our schools, about providing every one of our kids with a quality education and offering them the skills and the knowledge they’ll need to truly have an opportunity to compete on a global level.
Like I said—I worry! And what’s really crazy is that I spend all this time worrying about things that don’t materially affect me as an individual in any way whatsoever.
Just look at me! I’m white, I’m male, I’m way over-educated, I’m in good health, I’ve got a job that pays me more than I know what to do with, I’ve got a Cadillac healthcare package and I work in an industry where finding employment is as easy as spitting in any one of the four cardinal directions, I’m straight and free to marry whomever I want, I’ve got a great retirement portfolio, I’ve got a lovely apartment in one of the nicest neighborhoods in New York City, I’ve got access to the best public transportation system in the country—and yet I still spend all this time worrying!
Which is crazy, right? Because here we are in a country that seems hellbent on making sure the rich stay rich and the poor just shut the fuck up, and yet here I am—one of the haves!—and all this time I’ve been so busy worrying about the have-nots.
So I really just wanted to thank you. I’ve been foolishly voting against my own self-interest for all these years now, and it just warms my heart to know you all were looking out for me.
