In Life, The Choice Is Often Either/Or

I am linking up today with the wonderful Kelly at Mrs. Disciple for her FRIDAY FIVE. This week’s topic is leadership.

In the Academy Award Winning film, Braveheart, there is a scene where the Scottish Rebels are lined up on one side of a field, and the British nobles and their soldiers are lined up on the other side of the field waiting for the impending battle. William Wallace (Braveheart) comes riding up in full battle attire and paint. As he gets ready to ride across the field to talk to the British, one of his men asks him, “What are you doing?”

Wallace, in a thick Scottish accent says, “I am going to pick a fight.”

Photo from Hollywoodreporter.com

This election season.

It’s hard to even come up with a complete sentence without sighing and shaking my head, but I fully realize to many these words are picking a fight.

Keep in mind that I have a daughter named Reagan and a MacArthur Study Bible, so stereotyping me is not a huge challenge. I am incredibly comfortable in heated discussions smiling and saying, “Well…you know that I am a right-wing, religious nut.”

I am not actually a nut, but I believe most of the things that the other side associates with the far right. I am not at all ashamed of my beliefs because I am also committed to a life that is filled with grace and service, and spend infinitely more time working the many, many logs in my own eye than searching for other people’s specks.

MY GUY was the first one out of the race. Long before I knew Scott Walker had suspended his campaign, I was getting text messages and Facebook posts asking me who I was for in light of the new facts. RARELY, do people not know where I stand. (Walker/Gowdy 2016 would have been so, so good.) My next choice hung in there for a while, but then also stepped down.

Who is left was my last choice going in, but I am a pragmatist and I am keenly aware that life is often comprised of either/or choices.

I am an ABC gal. Anybody But Clinton. I also concede that is a weak position to take and a sad reason to vote for the leader of the free world. As time has gone on and I have re-examined what I believe and why, I am moving from ambivalence to believing that Trump could be the one for this moment in history. (Look up Ulysses S. Grant’s presidency and see if you find similarities economically.) I will share with you five reasons why.

The Hope Of Getting Rid Of Monopoly Money.

That is what we call it in our home.

Congress and the Executive Branch so easily spend money that is not theirs, it might as well come from a boxed game you buy at Target.

When the current president took office, the national debt stood at 10.6 trillion dollars. With the last budget signed, he will leave with 20 trillion dollars worth of national debt. That number is staggering and, frankly, disgusting. There is no rational reason to believe the trend won’t continue with Hillary Clinton as president.

Over in the Trump camp, however, they seem to see the potential and power of a dollar much differently. As the media and pundits on both sides  say Trump’s chances are slim because he has 1.2 million in his coffers compared to Hillary’s 42 million, you can almost hear Trump and his people laughing in disbelief as they respond: “‘Donald has proven before that he doesn’t need as much money as the other candidates.'”

This graph from NHPR.org is quite telling:

Seriously, do you see that tiny little Trump slice? If that kind of efficiency were brought to the Federal Government, I would celebrate!

Obamacare.

I hate it.

I have a daughter with special needs and a mother in law with severe dementia and neither of them have anywhere near the quality insurance coverage or medical care  they had before Congress “passed the bill in order to see what was in the bill.”

My daughter has specialists who no longer take insurance because of Obamacare.

We pay a doctor, I would never actually choose if I had other options, $2500 a year just to consider my mother in law a patient. He then bills for all appointments. Why? Obamacare.

Proponents of the monstrosity acknowledge that while my family has been pummeled by the plan, the greater good has been served. I neither agree with that, nor do I actually care.

I want my daughter and my husband’s mother to have good medical care more than I want the greater good ESPECIALLY since we were willing to work hard to provide it. Those who call me selfish for such thoughts make no difference to me.

Trump is the only hope I have for eliminating Obamacare.

The Way Things Are MUST Change.

The Democrats are against him. The media is against him. Many in the Republican establishment are against him.

That’s good enough for me.

We are numb to the ineptness that rules this country.

There was no budget passed by our leaders for six straight years, including years when the same party controlled both houses of Congress and the White House.

America’s credit rating was downgraded under this administration. How much more in interest do the American people pay as a result?

I find this all to be untenable. If Trump is a disaster and what is crumbles, okay. If Trump brings a tenacious business mind set to these issues and fixes them, okay! It is difficult to believe that an entrepreneur with phenomenal success in many areas would not desire to also see the country turn a profit under his leadership. He might begin with the basics of making a budget and increasing the credit rating.

I Don’t Think A Wall is Racist.

I am from California. I’ve spent most of my employed hours working in the restaurant business.

My husband works in the housing industry. We both have extensive experience with hard working, family-loving immigrants who also believe that illegal immigration must be dealt with.

Some sort of a border deterrent (like a wall) has been mentioned for years by people from both parties. I think there are sound bites available from both Clintons talking about such things.

Trump is just the first to suggest that Mexico pay for it.

I don’t think putting a fence around my yard means that I’m inhospitable, and I don’t think that putting up a barrier to make it more difficult to enter the country illegally is racist. And I absolutely believe that something  has to be done about illegal immigration.

We Need To Start Understanding Facts.

Trump is not the one I would have suggested for such an endeavor. However, he tells it like it is and it is resonating with people.

If those people get educated and start asking questions and examining information, there could be real hope. We need to encourage thinking citizens.

The Obama administration claims to have fixed the economy, but how is that possible with national debt doubling? Can you fix your family’s finances by putting everything on a credit card? Why should a nation be any different?

The following numbers are all taken from Factcheck.org.

The Republican party is presented to the world as the party for big business, while the Democrats are supposedly for the middle class. Is that how you understand it?

Compare that paradigm (of Democrats for the middle class and Republicans for the rich) to this: Under this administration, corporate profits are up 166% while real weekly earnings are up 3.4%. Which represents the middle class?

Homicides are down 13% while gun sales are up over 55%. Ownership of firearms is up AND violent crime is down, which party’s belief system lines up with those numbers?

Unemployment is supposedly down by over 600,000 people, while food stamp recipients are up by 42%. Does that seem odd?

If you keep in mind that unemployment reflects the number of people looking for a job, rather than the number of people who are not working, do those two statistics make more sense? (Stop looking for work and just get government aid…)

Trump, if nothing else, knocked a political system out of complacency. Jeb Bush spent $100,000,000 on his failed campaign. I am so, so glad that did not work because we have been bought and paid for, for far too long.

For a while the either/or of candidates this year felt like choosing between Sodom and Gomorrah, but now I believe we are already in Sodom and Gomorrah and the real calling is to run away and not look back.