Every where I went yesterday

the topic was politics and all those tangled webs of words that have been woven around us

What's true? what's not? why do lies take on truth just by being said?
Webs
Who thinks up these rumors and puts them out to scare people?
Webs
Why do we need to be scared instead of just informed?
Webs
How can we know enough to make good choices?

In the beauty shop they were very concerned by the fact that she didn't answer any of the questions she was asked, but they didn't like the fact that her skirt was too tight and you could see pantie lines and that she had on stilettos. (David Letterman said last night that in order to level the playing field Joe Biden wore stilettos as well. LOL)
In the small local restaurant where we ate lunch, three lovely older (even older than me!!) ladies were discussing it as well. Two of them were born in other countries, came here as brides, and were confused as to why women in American had embraced her. The American born woman was doing her best to explain what people saw in her but finally gave up and said, "I just don't know what has happened." Webs
The 2 men (close to my age) sitting behind me initially started out with a conversation about putting the band back together, including finding a drummer on Craig's List. You can get people on Craig's List? I gotta start reading that! They too moved into a political discussion. One comment really got my attention, he said:" Bush got me into politics, once he was elected I knew I had to get involved to keep that from happening again." So I'm thinking, I am deep in Obama country. Yeah!
Then several young people came in and were obviously friends of the kids working there. I wondered if they too would be discussing politics. Not at first, but then one of them picked up the newspaper and started to comment on the headlines. They sounded like my nephews and nieces with comical names for the candidates but one of them said: " Dude, why is that old guy so mad all the time? Seriously, dude needs meds." Webs, webs, webs.
The most telling of all were the homeless people on the bus. Now I am not sure where they get the sound bites. I don't think they carry around a TV hoping to find a place to plug it in, don't know that they have consistent access to newspapers or the internet and I wonder how many are registered to vote. But they certainly know what is going on and had strong opinions. Veterans for McCain was what was most voiced by the very inebriated man, he said it over and over, almost a chant. Especially after we passed one of those signs. Others wanted the cute one
(Sarah? say it ain't so! wink, wink, nose scrunch, finger wag) But one older, very neat but shabby, polite man went right to the heart of the matter. He asked: "Did any of them talk about us?" Somehow they seemed to have slipped through all of the webs since John Edwards is gone. How many issues can we keep track of?
I don't have all the answers, I can't keep track of all of the issues. I try, I read everything I can. I listen to people I trust voice their opinions. I think about this almost all the time these days. I work on sorting out those webs for myself.

I know I want smart and capable.
I want compassionate and knowledgeable.
I want someone who gathers the best and smartest around him to rely on and support him knowing together we are better.

I can also tell you what I don't want,
I don't want dumb and angry.
I've had enough of that.

PS: I wrote this last night and intended to post it before I went off to class today. But the trend continued. At the bus stop this morning, seeing my Obama pin, one guy said he was voting for the first time in his life because it was important to him to see Obama elected. Then he asked me if Obama was the same race as Clinton. He wanted to be sure those kind of people were elected. A very inebriated man walking by said he was voting for Sitting Bull 'cause that was who was the real president. I gotta quit riding the bus...