If you're anything like me, you're probably getting upwards of 50 to 100 emails and/or texts every single day, asking you to contribute to some member of Congress' campaign, or to a charity. I don't mind the emails I get from worthy charities, but because I get so many, I just cannot contribute to all of them, and when I see those emails about elephants being mistreated, or dogs needing to find a forever family, I'm nearly grief stricken because my heart breaks for those in need, especially innocent animals, but I just do not have the kind of money that allows me to give very much at all to any cause. My complaint when it comes to these texts and emails asking for money is that I'm getting them from people running for office not just in my State, but also for candidates for office running States all over the country. Apparently, the reason I'm getting so many requests for money is because in the past, I have contributed what little money I could to Joe Biden, and others, but lately, because it's that time of the year, it's just gotten to be more than I can handle. Just before I turned sixty-five, I lost my job, and for the past fifteen years, I've been retired, even though I hadn't intended to retire. I'm not someone who wants to sit around all day, waiting to die. I'm eighty years old, but I'm not your typical eighty year old. I'm active, very healthy, and for the past fifteen years, I never stopped looking for work. Unfortunately, there seems to be very little out there for anyone in their senior years, and Social Security simply doesn't pay enough, especially for someone like me who never had the benefit of a pension. So when these emails and texts come, all asking me to rush a donation, when they're from a political candidate, honestly, it pisses me off, and the same question keeps coming into my head... Why do I have to pay this guy or that gal to do their job when I'm living on less than $20k a year, and they start out in Congress at $174k a year, with tons of perks. In addition to the emails from politicians or would-be politicians, I get emails asking me to sign a petition for one cause or another, and because I find most of these petitions are for a worthy cause, i.e. calling on Congress to codify abortion rights, or to press Congress to pass the latest climate bill, what really bothers me is that I'm not just being asked to sign a petition, but once I agree to, I'm then asked to participate in a survey, asking me questions that typically I can only answer yes or no to, and when I've answered all of the questions, I'm asked "Will you rush $15 to help us?", and the only response seems always to be "Yes I will, and I'll contribute even more.", but almost never "I'm sorry, I just cannot afford to." And, with these petitions, again, the question, why do I have to pay to have a petition delivered to Congress? It's infuriating. What I want to tell all of these politicians is that when I actually see that you've done something to improve my lot in life, then I'll happily contribute, but so far, for a very long time now, I've seen very little in that regard. When the government was handing out monthly checks for people with children, even though Joe Biden promised to raise Social Security by $200 a month when he was a candidate, I wasn't getting monthly checks, in addition to my Social Security. During the height of the pandemic, while stimulus money was handed out like candy to business, and to millionaires like Kanye West, I got exactly two checks, and believe me, they didn't last very long. So all of these requests for money, regardless of where they originate, makes me uneasy, sometimes sad, sometimes makes me feel like Scrooge, and sometimes just angers me, and that's unfair, because by nature, I'm a generous person, but unlike that photo above, showing somebody's hands holding multiple hundred dollar bills, hundred dollar bills in my hands are indeed a rarity. What little money I have didn't go very far in the past, and now, as the price of everything from gas to food to clothing and other necessities is rising, seemingly every day, some of these requests, especially those requests asking for money for projects that the government should be funding... not asking me to... just enrages me.
So I guess there's only one solution to this problem is for me to stop giving any more of my hard earned money to any political cause, because what I've given so far doesn't seem to have had any effect at all. When I try to contact one of my representatives in Congress, all that ever happens is that I receive one of those boilerplate responses, telling me how much they care about my opinion, and giving me a verbal pat on the back for contacting them... but nothing else, and that's if they respond at all. Have you ever tried writing or calling one of your representatives in Congress, only to find that their mailbox is full, because like Krysten Sinema and Paul Gosar, two of the worst representatives I've ever had, neither one gives a damn, because Gosar sold his soul to Trump, and Sinema sold her soul to the highest bidder. Out of frustration over Trump not being held accountable, I penned a letter to Merrick Garland, and even though he's a public servant, working for you and me, I got no response to my letter. When Obama was President, I tried contacting him, unsuccessfully several times, and when I wrote a letter to him... as with Garland, I got no response. After the Supreme Court overturned Roe, I saw a young woman who was protesting being interviewed by someone in the news media, and her complaint was that while the Democrats had the President, the House and the Senate all in their control, they did nothing to codify Roe, but once the court overturned Roe, she got an email asking her to rush $15 so that they could get Roe codified. She was angry, and she had every right to be. So for me, unless and until I see the Democrats in power using that power to better all of our lives... unless I see them, from the President on down, fighting the fascists that have infiltrated the Republican Party with the same fury that the Republicans spread lies, rumors, conspiracies and complete falsehoods about Democrats, then I'm not going to contribute another dime, I don't care how urgent the cause, because as I've already pointed out... I've seen nothing good coming from my efforts. I'm hoping that the mid-terms will give the Democrats a solid hold on the House and Senate, that they'll have large enough numbers in the Senate to make Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema irrelevant, and that they will FIX the Supreme Court, by adding four liberal justices, impeaching and removing Clarence Thomas from office, impeaching and removing Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett for lying to Congress, overturning Citizen's United, and getting dirty, dark money... money that bought the Supreme Court... out of politics. Will all of this happen? It will only happen if all of us who give a damn vote BLUE come November, in numbers large enough to give us that solid hold on Congress that we need, and then, if we see that happen, we must not sit back and relax, because if there's one thing the Democrats have proven to me to be good at is snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. 🙏
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