To Comfort The Afflicted
And Afflict The Comfortable

To Comfort The Afflicted And Afflict The Comfortable

Friday, March 29, 2024

Observercast

How Did We Get Here?

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BY SHARON MARTIN

There are a lot of things I don’t understand. I don’t get how sound waves are captured and transmitted. I’m baffled by batteries. But what astounds me most is how people make decisions about which politicians to trust.

Here’s what I know is coming every time I bring up the number of lies told by the president:

  1. All politicians lie, or
  2. Remember when Bill Clinton said “it depends on what the definition of is is,” or
  3. Remember when Barack Obama said, “If you like your policy you can keep your policy.”

It’s telling that the examples used are always the same ones. I mean, how could you choose which of President Trump’s lies to use as an example when they now number in the thousands.

Why do people stand by him, a proven liar? Is it possible that nationalism is at the heart of all this? Are people so afraid that white, male Christians are no longer going to be in command of every institution that they must lie to themselves?

It’s possible. This state still hasn’t signed the Equal Rights Amendment.

I keep hoping that common sense and goodness prevail, that my friends and neighbors come to believe that the world is big enough for everyone in it. If we share.

Yes, we’re overpopulated. Humans multiply, but war and closed doors won’t fix the problem. In fact, they make most of them.

What are the answers?

Education and access to healthcare are essential. Educated women have fewer children. Access to healthcare insures that the children who are born are more likely to survive.

Humanitarian aid makes us strong. Diplomacy is more effective than war.

Kindness is strength. Community and justice aren’t dirty words.

We are all one human race, and every creature on this planet has a place. The bottom of the food chain is just as important as the top. Kill the plankton and you kill the whale.

It’s time to come to the center, time to find workable solutions that don’t just benefit the right or the left, the rich or the poor, the native or the immigrant. And it’s time to call out evil wherever we find it.

Corruption and evil are corrupt and evil, even if you voted for it.

Sharon Martin lives in Oilton, OK and is a regular contributor to The Oklahoma Observer. Her latest book, Not A Prodigal, is available through Barnes and Noble. Her recent children’s book, Froggy Bottom Blues, can be purchased in hardcover or paperback from Doodle and Peck Publishingand in paperback from Amazon.

Mark Krawczyk
Mark Krawczyk
March 9, 2023
Exceptional reporting about goings on in my home state as well as informative opinion pieces that makes people think about issues of the day...........get a SUBSCRIPTION FOLKS!!!!!!!
Brette Pruitt
Brette Pruitt
September 5, 2022
The Observer carries on the "give 'em hell" tradition of its founder, the late Frosty Troy. I read it from cover to cover. A progressive wouldn't be able to live in a red state without it.