A Political Essay From Middle America

I’ve been a Bush supporter from the very beginning. Yessir. As far as I’m concerned we needed to clean up Washington. When I voted in 2000 I was sending a message. And the message was: behavior like Bill Clinton’s will not be tolerated. Bush came across as a straight talker, sincere, ethical, good ol’ boy; the kind of guy you could go fishing with and then toss back a few cold ones. You know? But that Al Gore? Al Bore, right? Take that Al Gore fishing and he’d end up hooking himself. Come on! Could you imagine watching him on TV for years?

But now, I just don’t know what to think, honestly. I’m as confused as anyone. I’m no professor, I’m just a simple man. I worked with my hands my whole life, struggled to own a home, and raise a family. Life is complicated enough every single day, and I can't make heads or tails of the news or financial forecasts or none of that stuff.

I read in the papers that the President’s approval ratings are at an all-time low: 33%! I could have sworn that just last year they were up in the 40s, right? And before that he was re-elected, right? What’s happened? This thing started off so promising and now it seems so lost, like seed scattered to the wind.

I live in a nice, quiet town. We love America here. We put our flags out and we believe in service to this great nation. But I admit I’m troubled by Iraq. Oh sure, it really has nothing to do with me. I have not been asked to sacrifice my time or my money or my resources to fight this war on terror. I served in my war, and now our boys carry the torch in this one. And I can wave my flag and support those troops and cast my vote.

War is always crazy and messy. If it weren't it wouldn't be called "war." I just keep returning to one plain fact: Saddam was an evil man, and this country was founded to battle tyranny. Simple as that. We went in there and struck back at those terrorists, didn’t we? And now they want to blow themselves up to try to stop us? Ha! Good plan! That’ll save us the bullets I suppose.

But I just don’t know. Even though I really want to destroy terrorism, I still am not sure how I feel about Bush. I hear he’s involved in some kind of leak, or scandal? I don’t really understand it though. I hear maybe he’s spying on us? Well, he can spy on me all he wants. I have nothing to hide. In the process maybe he’ll catch some of those terrorists. As far as I’m concerned he can spy and fight terror all he wants as long as he keeps “it” in his pants.

Who are these people who don’t think we should be spying on terrorists? The Democrats? Ha! Don’t get me started about the Democrats. I never did meet one I could stand. You say “Ted Kennedy” and I say “Chappaquiddick.” You say “Bill Clinton” and I say “Ronald Reagan.” And look at Clinton. What did he give us? A sex scandal? I’m not surprised really. They’re all in bed with Hollywood and California and New York—immoral, left-wing, communistic company. Ask them to fight terrorism and they'd ask for the script.

And what do you know, they’re the ones that want to hand marriage over to the gays. Yeah, right! Keep that stuff out of my town. I went right down to those polls in 2004 and cast my vote against it. Stopped it dead in its tracks. That’s right. A whole busload of us went down and voted against that and voted Bush back into office. If he’ll keep it clean, he’ll get my vote. Damn right.

You know what? The more I think about it, the more I support Bush. The other day I was thinking of getting a putty knife and scraping my Bush / Cheney sticker off the tailgate of my Ford F-150. I mean, I wont say I like the guy, but I’ll take him over John Kerry or Jessie Jackson, or that guy with the fancy pants. Not in my America. My America was built on humble pants; blue jeans and work boots.

I do believe I’ll stick with that Bush. I’ll gladly be in the minority. Hell, all true believers are persecuted for their faith, right? We’re going through some dark times, and Bush is going through some tough tests. Those Democrats will throw everything they can at him, I’m sure. That’s how they do things, right? Smear tactics and sex scandals. But we will come through this better off. It starts with morals and ethics. If you don’t have that you don’t have anything. Isn't that what the good book says?