If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
People have responsibilities to children, family, and friends, which makes Tuesday a difficult day to go to the polls. In fact, that makes any day a difficult one to go to the polls. How can we encourage voter turnout and reduce disenfranchisement while preserving the quality and integrity of voting systems?
Prompted by the long waits President Obama criticized in his victory speech on November 6, the Senate is now the official arbiter of dozens of election reform proposals.
Historic, prediction-defying, shocking. These are some of the words used in the past week and a half to describe the outcomes of the November 6th election. Inspiring. That's the word I keep coming back to.
While most might remember November 6, 2012 as the day Barack Obama won his reelection, I will always think of it as the day I drove two ex-convicts to the polls.
The days were long, but the dedication of these volunteers was inspiring. When I would look around the room, I knew I wasn't surrounded by my regular church family, but I was surprised that it still felt like church for me.
We don't just need more jobs, we also need a rehab of the American dream. To build a new economy we have to let go of the old dream, of that American dream that equates work with necessary evil.
Overcoming a wave of voter suppression laws, misinformation, long lines, longer lies and Hurricane Sandy, millions of people still had their voices heard and ensured their votes counted.
Enforcement-only policies drive immigrants underground, where they're not only susceptible to hardened criminal elements but also powerless in improving their neighborhoods and partnering with schools in the educational lives of their children. In other words, enforcement-only policies are imprudent.
That's the word that keeps coming to mind. Giant results, and giant efforts that brought those results about. Countless people -- LGBT and allies -- made the calls, knocked on the doors and wrote the checks to bring us another step closer to that day when we are all truly equal and free.
What Francis of Assisi said of preaching is equally true of voting: do it without ceasing, and do it on Election Day only when necessary.
President Obama's reelection marks the most decisive mandate for an assertive, progressive governing model in well over a generation.
They've come out of the shadows to fight for their families and themselves. And now, the ones who can have shown that they will vote -- and that makes me explosively optimistic about our shared future.
I distinctly remember the metallic noise of the curtain closing behind my Mom and I as she entered her votes. The curtains were blue and scratchy and the booth was small. I liked being inside, as the mysteries of voting were a lot less mysterious in there.
Our country is moving forward in terms of open-mindedness and progressive ideals and finally -- albeit, slowly -- catching up to our neighbors to the north in Canada and many allies in Europe.
I am inspired by citizens rising out of complacency, questioning their beliefs on the economy, civil liberties, and foreign policies and I challenge us all to continue to be engaged as citizens, and as advocates.
While he's considered making a similar poster for the 2012 election, the artist says that it would be naive to deny the realities and changes of the last four years.
