The Mitt Romney Memorial “Bring out the Poor Vote Movement

Hello again. Yes, it’s me, the “mad-as-hell” woman who in my first video made a $2 bet with Mitt Romney that he’ll never make it to the White House. 

February in the US is Black History Month. Living in the St. Louis area, I’ve visited the Old Courthouse and stood in the courtroom where Dred Scott sued for his freedom. In its 1857 decision regarding Scott’s case, the Supreme Court held that blacks could not be citizens of the United States.

Essentially the court said that Dred Scott and his family were property and not human beings. They were things to be used by the rich without monetary compensation and without thought to their dignity and self-worth. 

Hmm… A parallel to the plight of today’s working poor might be in order here. Funny how the more things change, the more they stay the same.

In July 1868 the Fourteenth Amendment was passed giving the right to vote to all male citizens regardless of race. It seemed too good to be true the newly freed slaves. Of course, most good things come to an end all too soon.

By 1896, the Supreme Court held that the states could impose segregation so long as they provided similar facilities—the formation of the “separate but equal” doctrine.  It wasn’t until 1954 that the Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that segregation in itself was harmful to black students and, therefore, unconstitutional. The Civil Rights Movement had begun.


Leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. “had a dream” and stuck to it in spite of difficulties. So by the time I started first grade my reading materials featured stories featuring children of all races, as opposed to my older siblings’ boring  all-white “Dick and Jane” stories.


From the struggle of Black Americans we learn that when rights are systematically taken away from most economically and socially disadvantaged, step by step these rights have to be restored—hopefully once and for all.


In honor of the Fourteenth Amendment and the protections it gives to all Americans, I propose that we pledge ourselves to a new endeavor to help restore our rights as citizens… I call this, “The Mitt Romney Memorial Bring out the Poor Vote Movement”.  


If the poor don’t matter to fat cat politicians, because the poor are not seen as a large voting bloc, then maybe it’s time we change that perception. Maybe it’s time we help the poor be heard via the ballot box. Perhaps it’s time that these millions of struggling Americans are seen as human beings worthy of dignity and compassion instead of easily forgettable slaves to be used, abused and then downsized when CEOs decide to give themselves million dollar bonuses instead of investing company profits for the well-being of the workers.


Here are just a few ways we can help “Bring out the Poor Vote”:

1.      Let’s register to vote those who have been displaced by failed mortgages, lost homes and jobs and other financial hardships. If you know of someone who is living on their parents’ sofa or a family sharing a home with another family, perhaps they’re not registered to vote in the district they’re living in currently. We need to make sure these displaced voters are eligible to vote come November. So please help these struggling Americans get the necessary paperwork together in time to receive their voter’s cards. It’s a great way to meet your neighbors.

2.      Volunteer to babysit for a single mom. It’s a great way to help working parents who aren’t able to easily get to the voting booth with little ones underfoot. I’m sure they’ll appreciate having free hands to mark their ballots and a few minutes of respite from demanding little ones. You might even make some new friends!

3.      Help organize transportation for those without any means of getting to the polls. Distances between polling stations in suburban and rural areas can be quite large, so offer your neighbors a lift there and back again. It’s yet another way to make some new friends.

Yes, it’s time we as the 99% made our voices heard. We’re mad-as-hell and we’re not going to take it anymore. Let me know what ideas you have for helping to Bring out the Poor Vote, and I’ll keep you informed as to when Mr. Romney pays his $2 bet.

The Buck Stops Here Because We're Mad-As-Hell

The Buck Stops Here Because We’re Mad-As-Hell

by Cindy A. Matthews

Everything seems to be going downhill quickly these days in the US economy and in the political arena. Not being a politically active type of person, I can’t imagine the stress and horror die-hard Wall Street types and party members must be feeling lately. My husband and I discussed the dire situation we’re all in the other day and hit upon what we feel is the perfect solution to all our problems.

We simply need to junk the current two party system and begin again.

As Thomas Jefferson once said, “A government big enough to give you everything is big enough to take everything away,” so we're going to do just that--take it all away. To this end, we have started a third party that will sweep the next federal elections and clean out the seriously-self-centered halls of Congress. It will be a party of the little people (not that we can’t stand to lose a few pounds, but pasta is so much cheaper than meat when you’re living on unemployment). It will be a party made up on non-career politicians who only want to serve their fellow little people and then come home to the family farm, ranch, restaurant, shop, etc. You know—the way the original founders sort of envisioned our elected representatives would be like before all this political party bickering began in the election of 1800.

And we think we have just the right name for it.

“The-Mad-As-Hell-And-We’re-Not-Going-To-Take-This-Anymore” party or (TMAHAWNGTTTA party for short) is titled after that classic line from the classic film Network. Howard Beale (our party mascot—who needs an elephant or a donkey?) was a news anchor who told everyone to go to their windows and start screaming our party’s name until something happened to fix the world’s ills.

Network was quite a prescient story, and I don’t think it’s any coincidence that the mid 1970s and the early 21^st century have a lot in common—energy crisis, pollution crisis, unemployment, corrupt politicians (remember Watergate?), trouble in the Middle East, etc. So now is the time to learn from our mistakes we made forty years ago and clean up our economy and Congress and our environment all at the same time. As another little man once said, “The buck stops here,” and we’d better stop it in case it slides down further in comparison with other world currencies.

For Mad-as-Hell president we’re thinking of nominating Weird Al Yankovic. “Why Weird Al?” you may ask.Weird Al’s parody songs demonstrates he’s a keen observer of the culture and what’s wrong with it. Even if he can’t fix everything within four years he can at least entertain us with a polka version of the Star Spangled Banner. For vice president, my hubby suggests Sarah Palin (to gain the media’s notice) but I’m leaning more toward Cyndi Lauper. “Girls just wanna have fun” and who is having any fun in a time of economic and political crisis? Cyndi may just be able to help us on this very important point. (And I like how she spells our  shared first name to boot.)

Our platform will be made out of good old-fashioned, renewable wood. We stand for clean air, clean water, clean food, clean cities, clean language on the TV and clean underwear. But most of all we stand apart from those other politicians who seem to think that pointing the finger at the guy (or gal) across the aisle from them in the House of Representatives somehow defines what “good government” should be like.

If you want to join our party and start the crusade toward sanity, please feel free to forward this blog to your friends, family and other members of the human race. Tweet it up and Facebook and Google+ it to death. We’re “Mad-As-Hell-And-We’re-Not-Going-To-Take-This-Anymore” and we’re coming soon to a local, state, and/or federal office near you. We thank you for your support.

(Editor's note: Feel free to "like" our new Facebook Page: The Mad-As-Hell Party  Thank you.)

Vote Positive!

I’ve rapidly grown tired of this presidential campaign season. My weariness of all things political includes local, state and regional campaigns as well. No matter what the major political party is nowadays, they all seem to have one thing in common: They universally resort to slinging mud at their opponents rather than show how they’d go about to positively change the outcome of our current situation. In other words, negativity is the big thing in campaign 2008.

If you don’t think I know what I’m talking about, you could be right. I’m not a pundit or a Ph.D. in poly-sci. But I’ve been conducting my own non-scientific survey since the first political flyer landed in my overcrowded mailbox a month or two back. I’ve kept them all, and I’ve carefully gone through them, dividing them into “positive” and “negative” advertisements. Guess which side enjoyed a landslide victory?

Yes, I know I’m weird. I like to write—enough said. But if even a non-politically astute person such as myself can discern from the mountain of political ads that things have taken a decidedly negative tone in 2008 (even compared to the negativity of past years), then something is amiss. It seems no one has a positive outlook on life, our country or our form of government in general. Every candidate only sees the black clouds, never the silver linings.




Other than throwing open a window and yelling, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!” (that famous quote from the movie Network), I think the only thing I can do is to “vote positive”. I will vote only for candidates and issues that present their platform in a positive manner. If this means I’ll have to skip voting for a few offices, then so be it.

A blank ballot is a statement in and of itself, isn’t it?