Political Reality

I just got finished writing a lengthy post about my frustrations regarding the Utah Republican Convention last weekend. I'm not going to publish it though, because as Utah Dad reminds me, it's over for Senator Bennett and we move on the best we can from here.

So, here's all I will say on the subject. (Because we all need a soapbox sometimes and this is mine.)

First, Utah lost. We just lost out on representation by a truly great man. Senator Bob Bennett is a true conservative and he stands up for what he believes (which is frankly, not very different from what I believe). He is not a selfish, power-hungry man. He seeks only to serve. If you've ever met him, you would know this.

Second, we all need to be involved politically. Most polls taken before the convention show that the majority of Utahns supported Bennett and yet the majority of delegates did not. The people and the delegates were also divided in their opinions about even what issues were most important. Clearly this is reflective of the "hijacking" of the Republican party by the far right reactionary extremists that took place at the caucus meetings this year.

We cannot let the far right or the far left activists (they're called that because they're actually active) continue to decide the political atmosphere. One look at the Utah Republican and Democratic Conventions held last week and it would seem that we are a vastly polarized people. The Republicans ousted a very conservative incumbent because he wasn't "right" enough and the Democrats came close to ousting their man (Matheson will face a challenger in a primary) because he wasn't "left" enough. However, I don't believe that the majority of Utahns or Americans are really that divided. I believe that most of us fall somewhere in the middle of the two wide extremes where "compromise" is not an evil idea (by the way, I'm not suggesting that we compromise on key moral values). We must all become active. I don't mean "sign-waving, protesting, overdosing on talk-radio, obnoxious active". I'm talking about "paying attention to the issues, listening to the candidates, attending your caucus meetings, voting active". The delegates we send to the conventions can't and won't represent your values, ideas and opinions unless you attend the caucus meetings and vote for them.