Thank you to my friend, Dawn, who sent this great piece to me from her home in Michigan. For me, labels are not what really matter - such as liberal/conservative, Democrat/Republican, left/right - and often such categorizations polarize and impede finding common ground. And if I am going to use a label, I would personally often prefer, for instance, to use something like what Thom Hartmann refers to as being of the "Radical Middle". What is much more important to me than any labels are actions, such as who is standing behind what and who is truly walking their talk.Yet, I found in the below piece exactly that message of who actually stands behind what and who is truly walking their talk. I found it brilliant in how it overlays the paradox, the hypocrisy, and the myth of our seeming differences with the much more expansive truth of our shared values, interests, needs, and interconnectedness. I feel great gratitude for all who have worked, lived, fought, and died so more and more of us can live in a more caring and peaceful world. While war and soldiers are often given largely exclusive credit for "our freedoms", there is obviously a vastly larger picture of who we also need to celebrate, emulate, thank, and honor. Peace ~ Molly
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A new twist on Joe the Plumber
JOE THE PLUMBER
Joe the plumber gets up at 6:00 am and fills his coffeepot with water to prepare his morning coffee. The water is clean and good because some tree-hugging liberal fought for reasonable water quality standards.
With his first swallow of water, he takes his daily medication. His medications are safe to take because some stupid commie liberal fought to ensure their safety and that they work as advertised. All but $10 of his medications are paid for by his employer's medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance & now Joe gets it too.
He prepares his morning breakfast, bacon and eggs. Joe's bacon is safe to eat because some girly-man liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.
In the morning shower, Joe reaches for his shampoo. His bottle is properly labeled with each ingredient and the amount of the total contents because some crybaby liberal fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained.
Joe dresses, walks outside, and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean because some wacko environmentalist liberal fought for the laws to stop industries from polluting our air.
He walks on the government provided sidewalk to the subway station for his government subsidized ride to work. It saves him considerable money in parking and transportation fees because some fancy-pants liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.
Joe begins his work day. He has a good job with excellent pay, medical benefits, retirement, paid holidays, and vacation because some big city liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Joe's employer pays these standards because Joe's employer doesn't want his employees to call the union. If Joe is hurt on the job, or becomes unemployed, he'll get a worker compensation or unemployment check because some stupid liberal didn't think he should lose his home because of his temporary misfortune.
It is noontime and Joe needs to make a bank deposit so he can pay some bills. Joe's deposit is federally insured by the FDIC because some godless liberal wanted to protect Joe's money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the Great Depression.
Joe has to pay his Fannie Mae underwritten mortgage and his below market federal student loan because some elitist liberal decided that Joe and the government might be better off if he was educated and earned more money over his lifetime. Joe also forgets that in addition to his federally subsidized student loans, he attended a state funded university.
Joe is home from work. He plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the country. He gets in his car for the drive. His car is among the safest in the world because some America-hating liberal fought for car safety standards to go along with the taxpayer funded roads. He arrives at his boyhood home. His was the third generation to live in the house financed by Farmers' Home Administration because bankers didn't want to make rural loans.
The house didn't have electricity until some big government liberal stuck his nose where it didn't belong and demanded rural electrification.
He is happy to see his father, who is now retired. His father lives on Social Security and a union pension because some wine drinking, cheese eating liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Joe wouldn't have to.
Joe gets back in his car for the ride home, and turns on Rush Limbaugh. Rush is talking about how liberals are bad and conservatives are good.
He NEVER mentions that his beloved Republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Joe enjoys throughout his day.
Joe agrees: "We don't need those big government liberals ruining our lives! After all, I'm a self-made man who believes everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have!?"
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Peace may sound simple - one beautiful word - but it requires everything we have, every quality, every strength, every dream, every high ideal. -- Yehudi Menuhin (1916-1999)
All works of love are works of peace. -- Mother Theresa (1910-1997)
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