A Message to My Father

My father is a very well educated man. He holds a Doctorate in Veterinary Medicine from the University of Georgia. While I wouldn't put him in the group of intellectual elite, he was always well versed in politics, history, and the world at large. He will turn 70 in April. I turned 40 last May.

This past year we have grown apart. This is largely due to the political season and my support for Obama. While I expected my father, who is a life-long Republican to be upset with my support for Obama, I did not expect the fisure between us to be so vast.

Since I am a former Marine, an MBA, and a life-long Republican, you could have considered my vote to be secure in the GOP column. However, I have grown to see myself more as an Independent this year. I don't agree with all the views presented by Obama, I do see more that I like than I dislike. I believe Obama is the right man to run this country for the next four or eight years based upon what the country needs right now.

Where I see a rational discussion about what is best for America, my father sees conspiracy. He has believed at some point during this year that Obama is a secret muslim, a secret socialist, an anti-American mole, a liberal, a pupet of secret groups, a terrorist, and most recently, the mastermind behind the mortgage meltdown.

Of course, he will never say that race has anything to do with it. My father, a lifelong moderate (if there is such a thing) rascist suddenly doesn't see race. By moderate rascist, I mean he was never militant. Instead, he simply believed, when pressed, that the all races other than white were somehow inferior. He always thought that they would, when given the option, choose the wrong path--the easy path.

He, like so many of his generation, were raised in an environment that supported this view.

Somehow, my father's views did not stick to me. I went off to the Marines when I was 18 and served with people of every possible race or mixture of race. My experience in the military helped me see the world as it was, just like me. So how could I be any better or worse than anyone else?

So my message to my father is simple: your hatred is killing you.

I see a man who used to laugh, believe there was good in people, reach out to the world around him and hope for the future. Now, I see a man who thinks everyone is out to get him, tax him, take what is his, and ruin his country. I see a man who no longer things that our best days are ahead of us.