Last edited Wed Aug 29, 2012, 08:32 PM - Edit history (1)
My brother wasn't injured in the service and is a Democrat. My BNL the veteran was disinterested, plain and simple. Both are strong supporters of the social services for all Americans, particularly the disabled.
But my sister went teabag a few years ago and even he is having trouble with her outspoken screwy ideas, angry and hatred that has developed. It's finished our relationship, unfortunately, as she now see the part of the USA I live and myself by default, 'the enemy.'
She was furious about the 2008 debate where Ron Paul spoke against the war(s). She called me up, screaming he should be killed! For speaking against the war. This was even before the baggers got big nationally.
She knows I'm a Democrat and a dove so she considers me an idiot now because I'm not living in Glennbeckistan like her. I figured out her support for the wars and the military were based on her notions of survival and what she feels she has lost being married to a veteran, and what she gained by it and expects to get more.
The reason for her becoming a hawk, although no one in our family was, I believe, is pain. She has watched her hero go to pieces over the years. She thought they were going to do very well in life and that was important to her, the financial security and all that.
But it didn't turn out the way she planned. The mind looks for a cause, a blame. She decided, instead of the way some anti-war people have, that veterans got screwed, that there was a something else. That there is sacred reason for her discomfort. It had to be made noble, somehow.
That came to her in that way of thinking that soldiers are better and more entitled perks than any other citizen. That if they get sick and are without funds, their nation owes it to them and their family for life. That meaning her. So as long as she lives, she feels that she is entitled more than many others.
She has ranted about this many times, that illegal immigrants and people that have not worked as long as she did, are getting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. And she has literally stated that they are stealing from her.
It is not much higher than her own survival. She glorifies the MIC since it has given her a place in life that she was not able to achieve otherwise. She mocked my job which was heavy and dirty and was under a union contract. She worked for much less where she worked but they gave her a fancy title and she bragged she was management.
I have a kid and know parents who have kids that are disabled from birth and recieve benefits from the government. They fall in the category of the unworthy in her world view, since they were never able to do the kind of work that we were able to do.
It's pointless to argue equality or a social safety net with her. She is clinging to that idea she is better than other citizens, that her pain is greater than anyone else's. That may be the lifeline vets who are Republican are hanging onto, to demand the support and respect of the whole population, and survive.
Not well expressed, but what I learned from discussing it with her. I think most of the things that people do are about survival.
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