MY Response to the Response to the State of the Union Address

Before last night, I had seen photos of, but never heard, the junior senator from the state of Iowa. Since I am Iowa born-and-raised, I was curious about what Sen. Ernest would say. Iowans are blessed with a great education system, K to Grad School. There is an innate sense of fairness amongst its' citizenry, and a strong work ethic. There are blue skies, green pastures, and rolling hills. And there is also the tendency, especially amongst its' GOP base, to support some of the most right-wing, undereducated, and blindly opinionated candidates in the nation. That is not a blanket condemnation of the GOP in Iowa--I grew up with a lot of fiscally conservative Republicans, but their party was hijacked in 1976 by the "Moral Majority", and things have never been the same. Ever.
Joni Ernest was 6 when the "Moral Majority" took over the GOP in Iowa, and she's their blessed child.
But I digress.
I want to respond to Sen. Ernest's response.
First of all, let's put the "bread wrapper" thing to rest. If you grew up in Des Moines, as I did, you wore Wonder Bread wrappers to school, EVERY day in the winter (Joni probably wore Old Home Bread wrappers). Under your boots. To protect your shoes, because you only had one pair. EVERYONE did it. You weren't "special" in any way. It wasn't a sign of poverty or anything. It just was. To select that imagery to begin to tell her story first illustrates how out of touch Sen. Ernest is. And, mark my words, she will NEVER care about you or your problems. Because she will always have had it worse. If you are allowed, in her presence, to tell your story, she will always be pretending to listen, but actually be thinking, "That's nothing. I had to...." or "Think that's bad? My dad had to......" And then she will smile and say, "I worked hard. If you work hard, you can achieve like I have." I call bullshit.
Make no mistake, I admire the woman. She HAS worked hard, she HAS served her country (and I thank her for that), and she should enjoy her success.
But.
But, she should realize that the world she grew up in gave her a huge advantage over the majority of Americans. She was educated in good schools. More than anything else, that gives her a distinct advantage, and has set her up for success in this country. When she went to college, her total bill was probably less than $10,000 per year. TOTAL. She was nourished; she was probably never food-insecure. Imagine. Never having to worry if you would be eating dinner that night. Too many Americans cannot imagine that. And, although I know nothing of her family life, I would imagine there was an intact unit, maybe multi-generational, that gave her a great deal of support. My guess is there were no mental health issues, substance abuse issues, or physical illnesses that prevented her caregivers from giving her love, attention, and love. And, she was white. Period.
Joni Ernest was blessed. And, in being so blessed, it's made her unable to see the true struggles of others. Oh yes, she will talk a good talk:  “We see our neighbors agonize over stagnant wages and lost jobs. We see the hurt caused by canceled healthcare plans and higher monthly insurance bills. We see too many moms and dads put their own dreams on hold while growing more fearful about the kind of future they’ll be able to leave to their children."
Platitudes.
What's she's really thinking, what she's hoping YOU will think, is: "If you just work a little harder, you too can be in the 1%, and that's why you should be afraid of tax increases on those people. Stop whining! When you get to be in the 1%, you don't want to pay for THOSE people, do you?!!!" Trickle down, trickle down, trickle down...the promise is still there, over 30 years later, we're still buying it, and it hasn't happened yet!
It's the GOP party line, and it has been for years. But here's their honest truth:  "I'm not going to help you. I do not care about you or yours. I'm going talk one talk, and do exactly whatever will benefit me and mine. For as long as you keep electing us."
If Senator Joni Ernest and the GOP really cared, they would work to reform Obamacare, not repeal it. They have no plan, so why do we buy their awful line (“We’ll also keep fighting to repeal and replace a health care law that’s hurt so many hardworking families.")??? The ACA works. When was the last time you had to fill out a complete medical history when applying for insurance, worrying all the time that you would neglect to mention that bunion removal, thus allowing the insurance company to deny you coverage for a "pre-existing condition"?? Wasn't it great to carry your child on your insurance, after they graduated and were looking for a job? We forget about what it was like just a few short years ago. And we let the GOP help us to forget.
They talk now about infrastructure and jobs, but when it was 2009, all they cared about was making sure Pres. Obama was a one-term president. The jobs bills, the bills to employ people to work on our infrastructure? They voted "No". The only thing the GOP seemed to support then are the wars they didn't pay for, but now Sen. Ernest is willing to give lip service to the men and women who fought; good luck getting your GOP colleagues to support an actual bill that will actually help our vets. Don't believe me, Sen. Ernest? You said it yourself, "We’ll propose ideas that aim to cut wasteful spending and balance the budget — with meaningful reforms, not higher taxes like the President has proposed." Time and again, your GOP colleagues have demonstrated that bills for vets are "wasteful spending".
Sen. Ernest, I'm sorry. You failed. You could have done so much better; instead of inspiration, we were given--again--the party line. You're an Iowa woman, and had a national platform. You let this Iowa woman down.

From the State of the Union Tonight

""Imagine if we broke out of these tired old patterns. Imagine if we did something different.
Understand – a better politics isn’t one where Democrats abandon their agenda or Republicans simply embrace mine. 
A better politics is one where we appeal to each other’s basic decency instead of our basest fears. 
A better politics is one where we debate without demonizing each other; where we talk issues, and values, and principles, and facts, rather than “gotcha” moments, or trivial gaffes, or fake controversies that have nothing to do with people’s daily lives.
A better politics is one where we spend less time drowning in dark money for ads that pull us into the gutter, and spend more time lifting young people up, with a sense of purpose and possibility, and asking them to join in the great mission of building America.
If we’re going to have arguments, let’s have arguments – but let’s make them debates worthy of this body and worthy of this country.
We still may not agree on a woman’s right to choose, but surely we can agree it’s a good thing that teen pregnancies and abortions are nearing all-time lows, and that every woman should have access to the health care she needs."