Un Año Después...

Se me ocurrió repasar algunas notas mias del pasado reciente (puro aburrimiento quizás) y me encontré con algo que está cobrando más actualidad que nunca y que escribiera en noviembre del 2004. Lo reproduzco tal y como fué y en el idioma original confiando en que quienes visitan esta página "le pueden" al inglés.

A Worrisome Future

The race is over and whether we like it or not we will have four more years of George W. Bush.

Many times in the past I’ve made fun of the fear campaign waged by the Republicans in order to get the President re-elected.

I’ve also thought that common Americans would recognize the many faults of our leader and open their eyes to reality, where we lost the respect of most of the World, working class people and future generations got the bill for a war against a country who posed no threat to ours, big corporations are profiting more than ever (here and abroad), job losses are at an all-time high and many other issues not the least the more than 1000 American lives lost in Iraq.

Was I wrong?

While about half of the Country seemed to agree with me by voting for John Kerry, the numbers show a healthy margin on the popular vote for Bush. What this mean frankly I don’t know, except of course that Bush was re-elected.

Does it mean that half of the population didn’t care about the blatant issues at hand? Or, it simply means that myself (and the other half of the voters) are plainly wrong? Is it that the ones who voted for Bush really think we are in good hands?

How is it possible that States were poverty is rampant, jobs were lost and disenfranchised people wander how to make ends meet voted for Bush?

Has the fear mongering campaign being so effective to make many voters think that Bush is really a “war President and will save us all by the shear power of the military?

Or perhaps, most people voted for the folksy feeling of having someone in the White House they could relate to on a personal level? Someone they feel could be a great buddy to have a beer with and exchange stories on a fishing trip. Someone who is not too intellectually threatening and looks like a regular guy?

Who knows? Fact is, if I was not worried before, now I really am very concerned about our future. This re-election may launch an all out unleashing of policies and actions in the same venue we have been witnessing in the past and that‘s not good.

Fasten your seat belts because we may be going on a very rough ride from now on.