by Graviton Ring
http://www.helium.com/
Many people see obvious differences between Democrats and Republicans, such as rich old men being Republican, and liberal young college students being Democrats. There are probably some real differences, in this general point of view, which affect all of us.
My own point of view includes much more detailed and personal differences. My father grew up in a small Italian American town, which is now grown over with trees and weeds along the shore of the Allegheny River, about 25 miles northeast of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
While my father was about ten years of age, during the early 1900s, about half of the residents in this small group of immigrants, a few hundred of them, died in the influenza epidemic. This profoundly affected my father's emotional outlook for many years.
Obviously, a national health care system supported by the federal government, usually associated with Democratic ideals, could be seen as a result of this traumatic event, the influenza epidemic, which may have killed hundreds of millions of people worldwide.
My father's mentor, a young man in his mid teens during the epidemic, named Giovanni Dentino, accompanied my father during many visits to the homes of these dying residents. They tried in any way they could to help people survive. The community remained grateful to them.
Giovanni went on to be elected to the US Congress, under the americanized name, John Dent. He worked tirelessly for labor rights, such as the minimum wage, and health care for employees. While I was in the US Army, during 1962 and 1963, I visited Mr. Dent in his office.
I also attended many sessions of the US Congress, some of them presided over by Mr. Dent. Unbelievably, as many as one half of the Congressmen never showed up in any session, nor even in their offices, they often neglected their duties. A few were thrown out of office.
Today, only a few miles away from this small river town where Mr. Dent and my father lived as young men, my home is still dominated by people who can only be elected to public office by running as Democrats. This saturation even reaches the Pennsylvania governor's office.
My respect for Governor Rendell includes his humorous participation as a guest on a national public radio program, Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. While his humor and politics may not define his personal beliefs, I believe Governor Rendell cares about people as Mr. Dent did.
At age 69 years, during the last primary, I worked as Judge of elections in my voting district. This was my first adventure into political authority [smile]. Seriously, we were one of the best groups at setting up the electronic voting machines and counting the votes.
Many of the voting districts failed to set up the equipment and had to use paper ballots. My work as a computer programmer for many years made the task a simple one for me, so I was not expecting any reward. Nevertheless, Governor Rendell sent one of his people to thank us.
I am a registered Republican, entirely by mistake. Somehow, I lost my Democratic voting ID card several years ago. My county said they could not issue a new card except for changes. So I had to make some kind change in my registration to replace my lost card, or not vote.
Since I had already seen the federal income tax raised to ninety percent of a wealthy person's income by the Democrats, and since I had decided to become wealthy, I chose to become a rich Republican [smile]. Unfortunately, my income has not improved by any means available to me.
I am still mired in the poverty of my little town, however, this next year, if I earn my first million dollars, I will only have to pay 35 percent to the Internal Revenue Service for my federal taxes. $350,000 for federal income tax on my first million dollars, not bad eh?
