Ok, a post about my Mom, Reagan, and politics in general (about Independents)

(Reposted here as per Mod recommendation)

My mom is what I would call an independent - she didn't trust most anyone in office :)

She voted for Carter, then changed her vote to Reagan next election.

She was not up on all the issues, many people aren't. But they know when things are going crappy in general, and vote for a change.

I was the one who told my mom Reagan was running. I just happened to see him on a show in the AM (not many channels back then, otherwise I would not have been watching the show he was on) and he said he was running. I told my mom and she laughed "He's an Actor!" but as time went on she was more and more upset with Carter for many things (and I still remember seeing the very first Nightline with her - she wanted more done about the whole hostage crisis, etc).

Mom didn't follow politics to a T - she saw problems, saw them not being solved by people in power, and would vote against them if they didn't fix things. Pretty simple really.

Looking at Obama now, I think if mom were alive she would vote for him. The most simple reason is for change. She voted for Reagan twice, and for Clinton twice. It wasn't about party to her (her step-dad had been a repub mayor and police chief, her brother a popular dem in Ohio).

She also voted for JFK, and had stories about her life as it related to her (like, she was buying her freezer at Lazarus when she learned he had been shot, and until about a year ago that freezer was still running - it outlived her).

She saw change not always coming from a single party, but from changing parties when one party did not perform. Her loyalty was to making things better, not to a party. And she saw both parties as being complicit in causing issues.

She wanted change, she wanted us kids to grow up in a better world, and she was more than willing to throw out the people who didn't do the job and hire someone else.

People like her are the ones we will pick up this year, which is why I am more than certain we will win.

And it is people like her who will throw us out of office again if we don't do the job.

Mom was a good woman, not up on all the little things in politics like we are. Back in the day all ya had was the news paper and nightly news. Mom saw the news, saw it was bad, and voted for change. I think many people today are the same.

Complain about her all you want for her votes, but keep in mind - we are the underground because we are not like most other people who go about their daily lives and base their decisions on how things are in general.

This is our year, a year of change. And it will be up to our leaders to make life better so people like mom will keep voting for us, and it will be up to us to get the news out via the net how much better things are.

we won't need to get the news out via the net how much better things are -- if things are better, people like your Mom will know it. We won't have to tell them.

Loved the post........... :)

She is dead now :) But yeah, you are right - just seems to me thought that more people read news online (and emails) than pay attention to the big 3 like back in the day.