Temporary Sidestep for Senator Michael Bennet

I have never before used my blog as a pulpit for politics. I can't guarantee that I never will again, but at this time and at this place I feel it is simply necessary to go on the record for Senator Michael Bennet, who is in a tough re-election bid for the Second Senate Seat in Colorado against challenger Andrew Romanoff. Many of my readers will find it funny, odd funny, that I am not in the Romanoff camp. He would seem a natural match to one who considers herself often a salmon swimming upstream, an outsider, and an oddball. Many of my friends support Romanoff and I respect that. We're lucky in Colorado to have two viable choices for the Senate seat on the Democratic side... except that it is splitting the party.

And, that is at the heart of my argument with the Romanoff candidacy. Here was a fellow with good experience, but out of work during hard times. We know he sought a job in Washington, DC. There is nothing criminal about that. But, when that didn't pan out, and being Lt. Governor with Gov. Ritter didn't work out, he took a look around and found what he thought was a weakling in the party -- Senator Michael Bennet. Then he willfully split the Democratic party in Colorado in two by entering the race against our incumbent. I fully believe he expected gentle-seeming Michael Bennet to shrug his shoulders, and say "Aw shucks, you can have it, Andrew."

This can only come from an inane, insane sense of entitlement even though the world clearly pointed out to Romanoff that he had more work to do to convince people in power that he could accomplish necessary goals. Part of this is the Colorado Democratic Party's fault. Along the way while Romanoff served in the State House they must have filled his head with how indispensable and important he was. I remember listening to him talk on Colorado radio, and I enjoyed his full-of-himself ideas at the state level, but I can't think of it at the National level without chagrin.

If you've been reading me, you know I can't separate "reality" from "spiritual" in the sense that I look at a person's story from that angle, and I look at a group's story from that angle. What I see is that a group of people who I observe as working very hard to turn around a misguided ship that is nearly ready to run aground after eight years of Bush, Owens, etc., has come out in support of Michael Bennet, and that causes me to wonder about the notion that Romanoff so deserved to be appointed Senator that he has the right to split our party in this election. Spiritually, I see Andrew Romanoff heading for a big surprise that I hope will help him grow and evolve as a human being less interested in pointing at himself and saying, "I deserve it!"

So, I listened to their speeches at the County and State Assemblies. I saw that Romanoff garnered a lot of excitement, but I found that it boiled down more to personal magnetism than actual policy transformations or a drive to get things accomplished. When I heard Michael Bennet I observed a different, and somber tone. It wasn't a salesman selling me a personality by any means. It was a sober assessment of the problems we face, and the work, the chopping wood, carrying water WORK it is going to take to get the change we apparently long for in this country.

There was a time that I wanted to believe that we could think-system our way towards a better world, but as I have matured, I appreciate that those ideas must be married to the reality of hard, patient, non-thanked, low-attention getting work. I believe that this is Michael Bennet's true gift. Already he's accomplished in a short year and a half in Washington, DC, many legislative maneuvers that far more experienced Senators seem to fluff up. He's on good committees. He's proposing changes in the way the legislative process works so that people have to identify themselves and their beliefs instead of being wolves in sheep's clothing. Here's his website: http://bennet.senate.gov/ Please go and check out what he's been up to and make your own assessment.

The only way that Romanoff has been able to differentiate his basic legislative views from Michael Bennet is by claiming that he won't take Corporate funding for his campaign. He claims this will protect his vote. However, I believe it will leave him as a marginalized figure from a remote state, lost in the muckety-muck that is Washington, DC. I believe it will make him a prime target for the Republicans of Colorado to scare people into thinking he won't work with businesses towards a better economy. At a time of 8.5% unemployment, it just makes me scratch my head.

I want our Senator to be able to look anyone, an individual or a "Corporate Citizen" in the eyes and tell the truth, even when it hurts. I believe that Michael Bennet knows how to tell the truth. I believe this is why he has the support of the Colorado Democratic Leaders, and why he deserves our vote in August.

Chapter Ten - Part Three - POV II

Philosophically, taking a point of view means that you've invested in a belief about a situation. It is so interesting to me to allow myself to take the time to question my stories with the idea that I ought to have a point of view about the outcome because for the last decade or so I've been working a lot with the concept of detachment. Detachment is not the same as disassociation, but it is a fine line. Detachment to me means that I accept that I don't have control over the outcome of a situation though I have intent. I'm not sure intent is strong enough to form a point of view. I think of my friends who chose the path of attorney, and how they must fight for what they believe the outcome should be, and find myself too willing to look at the other side of things.

So I return to my potential orchard site. Placed on a hill with an uplift of 8%, I admit it is dangerously facing towards the Western sun. The Western sun represents the afternoon of life. In some Eastern traditions it represents the decadence of the West, the cocoon of stuff and points of view we've built around ourselves, the illusion that we have control. In European legend the West represents a final frontier, an opportunity for new beginnings. It used to be a real place, but of course, now we have a world where there really is no West because the further we go West the sooner we reach the East. Now the West is just a symbol, an idea, a point of view.

For an orchard facing the west can be okay...if there are no winds. The winds from the West can alter the growth of trees by steady pressure. I'd say this is a definite symbol for me. The pressure of life itself is like that wind. I don't have the luxury of youth to believe that I'll eventually get to the right time in my life to get this thing planted. I can't just rip down the fields planted on the Eastern, protected slope of my life because they are filled with the crops of motherhood. So, it's going to be the Western slope. The afternoon of my life. Life is going to necessarily shape my point of view to be much more specific than it might have been earlier.

My point of view is the camera through which I peer at my story. Through that camera I open and close the aperture of my gaze until I've got a razor-sharp focus on what I actually believe about life and it's outcomes. Maybe I will end up fighting for my belief that I have no control over the outcomes except how I respond, how I accept, and how flexible I am in my move on.