Mood:
not sureTopic: Politics and such
On Tuesday, Baltimore's Women in Black (a peace activist group) had their annual "Peace Path." Everyone was invited to stand on Charles Street with banners and signs calling for troop withdrawal. They've done this every year for the past couple years on 9/11. The idea is to pray for peace on the anniversary of such a tragic event. The vigil is carried out quietly and respectfully.
I stood out briefly with them last year, and again this year after work (it takes place during evening rush hour, so lots of people in cars can see you). I've also occasionally taken part in some other vigils held by the meeting house on the same particular strip of Charles Street I stood on Tuesday.
But we've never had quite such an overwhelming positive response before, I don't think. Nearly every car seemed to pass us by with waving passengers, supportive honks, and smiles. Bus drivers saluted us. Pedestrians gave us big waves and thumbs up.
Baltimore is theoretically pretty liberal... but when you think about it, at this time of day, most of the cars passing by are commuters heading back home to the county, where political views tend to run more moderate to somewhat conservative. If it's those folks who are more willing to show their support to end the war and withdraw troops, that's a sign of change right there. Opposition is turning to apathy, apathy is turning to hoots of support for peace.
If only we could gather enough people who care to get the President to sit up and notice. It's a democracy. He works for us. Let's make him do what we pay him to do. (Maybe we are. The bill everyone's looking at is certainly a step in the right direction.)
But in other news.... apathy still definitely reigns supreme within the city limits. All the people who seem to care drive home elsewhere.
What am I talking about? We had our local city primary on Tuesday as well.
28% of voters turned out. Twenty-eight-freakin'-percent.
Look, I love this city. I voluntarily moved here, when there're lots of other places I could've gone. But no one is blind enough to not know that Baltimore has serious problems. Crime is rampant. The schools are a freaking wasteland. People should want to change this. But with nearly no voter turnout, the same damn people who've been sitting with their heads up their rear ends have just been reelected. (And understand here, this is the democratic primary. It's not even voting along party lines that's the problem here (that's just what happens during the general election.))
I don't care if the other 70% of voters might've voted in the same people who got elected. We have two tangible duties in this democracy of ours: pay taxes and vote. Voting is not hard. Takes a few seconds.
The idea that the majority of people in Baltimore seem happy with the status quo just bothers me beyond what I can express. And I realize that's probably not why people haven't gotten to vote. Maybe there needs to be a new effort towards voter education. I wonder how one would go about pushing for that. Maybe I'll go find out.
Updated: Thursday, 13 September 2007