It’s time. Time to do the uncomfortable and write about what’s going on in our country. I, like many Americans, have reached a breaking point. Everything seems almost surreal. In truth, this has been a long slow death – almost as if someone crept into the window while we were all asleep and smothered us. Something that could happen when you leave that window open, and invite the killer in.

A wise man once told me “there’s the rich, and all the rest of us”. I’ve held onto that for most of my life and understand that statement even more as an adult. I’m saddened by the constant fighting and bickering on subjects that have been brought to the forefront of everyone’s conversations by those that take pleasure in just watching us go at it. “It’s easy to take what you want when you have a distraction.” Another nugget of knowledge passed onto me. While everyone is looking one way and caught up in arguing, the thief is in the other room taking everything that’s dear to you. Think about that for a moment and apply it to the numerous topics floating around.

The two party system is garbage, plain and simple. We’ve all said it: “I guess I’ll just have to pick the lesser of two evils.” That sets us up for failure right there. Subscribing to a party, rather than a country is part of the blurred line. Stop and think, when was the last time you can remember that we, as Americans actually stood by one another? In my life, it was 9/11. I don’t have to say anything but 9/11 and we all know what I’m referring to. How each and every one of us can remember exactly where we were and what we were doing when those planes hit the World Trade Center. The country unified and the flag was Glory, once again! Everyone was proud to be an American and looked for ways to help others. We came together with a common bond. That bond has been broken, and the hard question we all have to ask ourselves now is, are we willing to fix it, or are we going to go to our corners and break this great nation?

I’ll go back to my original quote on here. “There’s the rich, and all the rest of us.” Rulings that have come from the Supreme Court over several years now have been items pushed by those that can afford to buy what they want. Citizens United…a catchy name with an awful effect on our country. This opened the flood gates for any amount of monies to be dumped into political campaigns. Money bought our votes away from us. It took the attention of politicians away from hearing our cries, to coddling handlers. Democracy cried that day. Democracy is not only crying, but screaming now, in this time. Things are happening that I never thought I’d see in my lifetime, or anyone’s lifetime for that matter. Rights are being stripped away, freedoms that we’ve all enjoyed, along with our voice, our vote. Gerrymandering by both parties has caused so many voters to become disenfranchised or just hold back from voting. People of different races and religions have had their say snuffed out. These are the very things that started this freedom experiment in the first place. We pushed back against a king in order to seek our own way of doing things. Free to worship as we chose, without any form of retribution. A nation where “we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” These are the words and values that were placed before us by flawed humans. Yet, while flawed, they sought to make a better tomorrow.

We’re fast approaching what could be our last true “free” election. I don’t care what party you’ve subscribed to in the past, this is for real and serious. There’s a 920 page manifest out there that everyone needs to take the time to view called Project 2025. If you’re not scared yet, you will be after reading through it and also paying attention to the latest decisions handed down by the Supreme court. We are on the doorstep of handing all the power over to one man. The government as we’ve always known it, will cease to exist. No more checks and balances, no more discussions. It will all be decided by one person, with no stopping point by the rule of law, because he’ll be immune from prosecution.

The super rich in the country have been quietly working away to bring this about. They don’t want us to have a voice. They don’t want us to get along and have a common bond, it’s not good for their pocketbooks or power circles. I ask you, are you willing to sacrifice everything that so many have given their lives for? Those that gave everything so that people like me can sit here and speak on this blog in this fashion. To say hard truths without fear of being locked away forever.

Now in all honesty, I think you already know that I’ll be casting a vote for the Democrat this November. Not because I love the guy, but because he will at least keep us going as a country of freedoms. It’s not perfect, there’s much to be done, but it will at least give us a future. A future without persecution for being a less than perfect human, as some would see us. One that allows all of us the right to find our happiness. I want us to be Americans in November, standing united. I want to be able to look back when historians write about this moment and say that we came together for a just cause and did the right thing. We stood together, hand in hand for our future. For the future of our loved ones. America…are you listening?