An open letter to Senator McCain from a single mother

Dear Senator McCain,

I was reading highlights from your new stump speech–Politico was good enough to bring it to my attention. I thought perhaps you’d like to know what I think America needs… because I think you’ve got it all wrong.

America doesn’t need a fighter, an instigator, a President who will always frame America in an ‘us against them’ light. America needs to step away from this zenophobic, isolationist path we’ve been down for nearly a decade. We need to know our fellow human beings. America needs a tough negotiator, a firm diplomat on the world’s stage, a leader and an educator who will shine a true light on the issues we face, at home and abroad.  America needs a president whose open hand  heals and brings consensus, not a president who uses fear and ignorance to drive a wedge deep into the heart of our country. Case in point: yes, you tried to come to Obama’s defense on Friday. But your gaffe showed me what you truly think about Arabs: you don’t quite think they are human, do you? Because you told that woman that Obama isn’t an Arab… “he’s a decent family man…” as if somehow, Arabs are not decent human beings at all. Shame on you.  America is a land of dreams, and Lady Liberty welcomes all… not just old, rich, white men like you.

America doesn’t need more spending on military defense, on the idiots who got us into this financial debacle in the first place. How are you liking that $8 million that Wachovia gave the NRCC after they got bailed out? Huh? How does that make me feel, with a couple thousand in Wachovia’s banks, and not much more saved up besides. How do you think I like watching my 401K disappear? Forget opening a college savings account for my son, now. I might as well just stuff my mattress.

How often can  you come to the middle class and ask us to open our wallets yet again? How much can we put ourselves into debt, spending money we don’t have on items we don’t need at interest rates we can’t afford, because you think it’s in the nation’s best interest to consume? How stupid do you think we are? America needs fewer material goods and more intellectual property. America needs to invest in its ailing infrastructure, its deplorable public education system, and the future possibilities for jobs and prosperity offered by such amazing initiatives as alternative fuel sources. I don’t want you to drill in America for more oil. I want you to find alternative, renewable, negligible-impact sources of energy for me. I’m going to have a green roof on my house and solar panels some day. What are you going to do to pay back my son? How are you going to fix the damage you’ve done to the Earth that our children, and our children’s children, will inherit? When’s the last time you bought something second-hand, or reused something instead of putting it in the trash? What do you know of conservation and stewardship? All you want is profit. At what cost?

America needs selfless leaders who govern, not because they think they can, but because they have been entrusted with the true voice of the people. Senator McCain, you do not speak for me. You do not have my country’s best interests at heart. You do not care about protecting me. I am not your status quo. But I am the future, and I will have my say. I will vote on November 4th. I will encourage my friends, my family, my readers, my loves, to vote on November 4th. And I will ask each and every one of them to disregard the smear campaigns, the lies, and the bully pulpit from which you reign, and ask them to make an educated decision based on the facts.

And you will lose. Because you don’t know what America needs or wants, and I think America is tired of having the powers that be ram their special interests down our throats.