This Tuesday is the major election of 2010, when the citizens of the whole country express their opinions at the polls and the resultant outcome can either baffle us or stun us into a celebratory evening. This year the stakes are higher than average, it seems, because of the changes in the election process that have been effected by a recent Supreme Court decision which resulted in virtually unlimited corporate funding for some political positions and offices.
Very few people are like me in my recent determination to leave television behind, preferring other use of my time and other sources for my education or entertainment. When the local broadcast stations limited TV reception to HDTV I just left the whole thing behind, using internet for my most likely source of information. Therefore I haven't actually been one of the many subjected to multiple negative ads during this election season. Lots of people undoubtedly just mute them. But others may be absorbing the competition as making some weird sense. Will this become part of the total dissemination of punditry after the fact? We will soon know the outcomes and wonder once again how well our democracy is in fact functioning.
My own greatest concern during the past year has emerged as a regard for the environment as we more and more hear reports about the use of carbon based fossil fuels that are likely contributing to the changing temperatures recorded across the globe. The startling fact in this state and in the country as a whole is that political personalities and organizations we identify as to the right are apparently dazzled by contributions from corporate sources which have an interest in denying climate change. In fact they apparently want to flat out block environmental safe guards from being legislated into place.
Congressman Roy Blunt, now running for the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Christopher "Kit" Bond is one of the recipient of these funds, as reported in the NEW YORK TIMES. In fact, a graph referenced from that page under "multimedia" shows by color contrast that far more of those funds have been distributed to Republican candidates than to Democrats.
Here are some further references to the current news in environment that affects Missourians. I wish that I could report that the super high speed train route between Chicago and St. Louis is in the works, but it is postponed for now in favor of other upgrades in the midwest.
http://www.stltoday.com/news/science/article_80c9519f-f5bb-54ab-bb53-cd204355c523.html
http://www.kansascity.com/2010/10/30/2371425/gop-plans-attacks-on-epa-and-some.html
http://www.kansascity.com/2010/10/28/2367093/amtrak-to-buy-70-locomotives-for.html
http://kmox.cbslocal.com/2010/10/28/missouri-high-speed-rail-gets-boost/
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Our ability to reach unity in diversity will be the beauty and test of our civilization.
Mohandas Gandhi
