“Sour Grapes”

Why is there so much anger and fear being expressed in the public debate over the White House’s moderate, compromise plan for health care reform? Have you had a chance to stop and think on why there are so few people of color or young people of any nationally actively protesting the soft, largely optional, reform plan. The main reason is because we won the last presidential election! Let’s face it, many people find it hard to accept that they were smashed at the polls back in November and a new America is on the rise. An America in which white skin privilege isn’t what it used to be. So at the adrenaline charged forum/debate/demonstrations, they’re unintentionally showing all of America and the world their true feelings and their “true colors”.

When I was in grade school, at Ladd and Meservey, my parents were members of the NAACP. So was I. I carried around my NAACP youth member card in my Roy Rogers wallet. Late in 1959, I also Elmer’s glued a small JFK campaign button inside the wallet where my money would have gone, if I had had any. Recently as I watched CNN, I focused in on the expressions distorting the faces of the fanatical anti-healthcare bill protesters. They reminded me so much of the hate filled expressions of those who, in the ’50 and ‘60s, lobbied, protested and murdered to prevent American citizens from gaining basic human rights. Whipped up by today’s right-wing demagogues, I heard the same venomous cackles and I could see the same frantic ignorance and fear dominating their gaze. For them, the subtext was health care. But the real theme was President Obama and his refusal to buckle when confronted by their hysterical rants.

If you happen to speak with any of these apoplectic protesters, let them know that if they’re really against government-run or so-called socialized medicine, they should immediately cut up their own and/or their relatives’ Medicare cards, because Medicare is exactly that.

Editor’s Note: Lloyd Daniel is a writer, educator and a former member
of the Missouri State Legislature. To read, watch and listen to more of
his work, logon to his website. The address is www.localhost:8000