In 1999, I was injured in a factory accident that altered my body forever. I lost much of the function in my dominant hand and developed a chronic pain condition which eventually spread to other parts of my body which plagues me to this very day and has, in fact, worsened. Like many people who find themselves in such a situation, I ran into difficulty with the worker's comp people and needed to get a lawyer. My lawyer (who sucked, (BTW) was a preachy liberal who espoused the dogma that poor people needed to support the Democrats. As a lifelong Republican, I kept my opinions to myself and I smiled politely and pretended to listen. When I got home later, I talked about it with my dad...
I asked him why my lawyer would say such a thing, and he explained a fundamental difference between Democrats and Republicans which forever confirmed for me that I made the right choice when I chose my party affiliation at 18 when I first registered as a voter.
My dad said that if you're poor and want the government to give you money but only just enough so that you'll remain poor and dependent on the government, vote Democrat. If you're poor and wish for a country in which you may find opportunities to work your way towards a better life, vote Republican. If you have money and don't mind it being taxed away from you to support those who don't want to work, vote Democrat, if you have money and wish to be able to keep more of what you've earned so you can CHOOSE who you'd like to help via charitable donations, vote Republican.
That was 11 years ago, and my dad said it much more eloquently, but the above is pretty much the gist of it.
My dad passed away a year later, on January 18, 2001, my dad had a heart attack/stroke in my kitchen and spent 8 days in a coma before he died. As the ten year anniversary of my losing him draws near, he is very much on my mind. I miss him terribly and know that he'd be very disturbed to see what our country has become, but I think he'd find comfort in the knowledge that more Americans are waking up every day and fighting to right our nation once again.
I am still cash poor, but I am rich in optimism and do not intend to be poor forever. I WILL earn that better life, and when I do, I will be in a position to help others, but I want who I help to be my CHOICE, I do not want the government to choose FOR me, so I remain, as always, a Republican. Now we just need to get more people in the GOP to remember what Republicans are supposed to stand for and stop being "Democrat Light".
There really isn't a great purpose to this particular blog post, I've just been thinking about my dad a lot and remembering some of the stuff we used to talk about. Do me a favor; if you have people in your life who you love, tell them NOW because you never know when they may suddenly be taken away.
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This post was linked by Doug Ross in Larwyn's Linx, thanks, Doug!
