State of the Union

Author's Note: Please read this post carefully and in its entirety before you get angry or judge my view or anything else. 

Two nights ago, President Obama gave the State of the Union address. In my opinion, there wasn't anything new until the second half of it; the beginning was just a mash-up of all his campaign speeches and part of the inaugural address. In the second half, there were statements about different subjects in which the President mentioned that we can do better. There were not specific ways mentioned to get us to the point of "doing better."

At certain points in Obama's speech, there was applause. Sometimes everyone stood up, sometimes some people stood up, and sometimes everyone stayed seated. Apparently, this showed which senators support or do not support the statement at hand.

Here are some of my questions:

• Is it a partisan issue to have equal rights for women? When the President mentioned the Equal Pay Act and there was a standing ovation by about half of the chamber, the camera focused on a few female Republican senators who remained seated and did not clap. This bill is for them. Do they not want equal pay? Is having the vote enough; do we not need to actually have equal rights?
• Is it a partisan issue to keep our planet clean? We all live here. All of us. It's not like global warming is going to skip over the congressmen and women who refuse to pass a bill that promotes clean energy. Our environment is the only one we have; we don't have anywhere else to go if our climate gets so extreme that we kill off our planet. We will all be effected.
• Is it a partisan issue to help people in poverty? Don't we all want a strong country? An argument I've heard from a lot of Republicans is that the poor "just need to work harder." Right. Is that what Jesus would have said? The only reason I'm mentioning Jesus (because, yes, I acknowledge that it's not directly related) is that a lot of these Republicans are the same ones who run around mentioning Christianity. If they want to take this Lenten season to reflect on the life of Jesus and prepare for his coming (as is the wont of Christians during this time of the year, I understand), maybe thinking about solving poverty in our country would be a good place to start.
• Is it a partisan issue to have equal education in this country where we offer free public education? Schools are getting intensely competitive and even preschoolers are having to procure letters of recommendation to get into the kindergarten their parents want them to attend. But not all parents can afford to send their kids to preschool. Just a few weeks ago, the governor of Kentucky, who ran on a platform of state funded preschool for all children, cut funds. The funds he cut were to the program that gives single mothers who are enrolled students at a state university free preschool for their children while they go to school. So, now those mothers cannot obtain a higher education degree because they have to stay home with their children. Do you see how this is a broken cycle? Do you see how this is a humanitarian issue, and not a Republican or Democrat issue?
• Is it a partisan issue to keep military grade guns that were never intended for civilian hands off our streets? There is not one, not one person in Congress who thinks we need to take everyone's guns. No one is saying that. But that's the only argument against gun control I'm hearing. I'm going to repeat: no one is trying to take your guns. But semi-automatic killing machines that were built for the battlefield have no place in our neighborhoods. And I don't think that if any one of the children of any member of Congress had been in Sandy Hook Elementary School in December, there would be a dispute about this. 

These all seem like subjects we can agree on. All of us. If at this point you're reading this thinking, "No, those aren't high priorities for the government; that's an issue for individual people," please put either you or your family in the position of anyone in any of the above scenarios. Go ahead. Let it sink in. I'll wait.

Can you see how upset you would be if you were enrolled in school, one semester away from getting your bachelor's degree (putting you in the top 30% or so of educated people in the country), your three-year-old's preschool was suddenly cut, and you couldn't finish school so you could get a higher paying job to make a better life for your child than the one you had? Or can you understand how angry you would be if you'd worked your tail off for 25 years in your career, got a PhD in your field, were internationally respected, and then found out that you make 15% less money than your male counterpart, just because you are a woman? 

Now that you've actually thought about what it would be like to be in those situations and we can all agree that they're problems of the non-partisan sort, let's get to work on figuring out how to fix them.

Cue: Arguing.

Yes! This is where the arguing starts. Disagree on how we are going to fix the problems, not on whether or not we should fix them. This is where people, in both Congress and the general public, disagree. We can and should disagree, at least a little bit, on how to fix things. Disagreement, if done in an intelligent and respectful way, can foster the best compromises and solutions. But there must be solutions. And there must be compromises. Neither side--neither side--will ever get everything they want. That's not how building community works.

Please, urge your congressperson to do what is right for our country. Please stop disagreeing with progress just because of the party of the person who suggests it. We need to get our country moving together, not in two halves.

"Be the change you wish to see in the world." --Gandhi