Lilac Colored Glasses

rub·ber·neck
intr.v. rub·ber·necked, rub·ber·neck·ing, rub·ber·necks
To look about or survey with unsophisticated wonderment or curiosity.

Taken from the American Heritage Dictionary online, this phrase is commonly used in America to describe what people tend to do when passing the scene of an accident or other equally attention grabbing phenomena.

I’ve been rubbernecking the state of American politics since I expatriated and this morning I made a decision; I am mailing my absentee ballot in next week. I’m voting for Barrack Obama. Hillary’s 3 a.m. ad and all of the not-so-subtle messages behind it lost her my vote. I wanted a woman in the oval office so badly, but not badly enough to vote for someone who’s using scare tactics on the American people as enthusiastically as the current monkey inhabiting the White House. I’m not thrilled about the fact that Obama has very little experience in the decision making aspect of government, but I’m even less enthused about Hillary’s slimy, sleezy campaign tactics. I’ll take hopeful, if somewhat naive speeches over despicable conduct any day.

Once my ballot goes in the mail, I am through concerning myself with America and it’s politics. It’s embarassing; George W. Bush’s war mongering crimes against humanity and his transformation of America into a police state that is galvanized solely on fear make me ashamed to admit that I’m an American. Hillary Clinton’s underhanded accusations and blasé semi-denials of the mud that her campaign is slinging humiliate me when the people here mention the Pennsylvania primaries. The fact that, when it comes down to it, the great melting pot, the land where everyone is supposed to be equal, is still bickering over gender and race, is shameful. The Democrats are so busy tearing each other down that in the end, guess who’s going to win?

Another old, white man.

And we’ll all be the losers.

CB and I had to go to Brussels today to get some paperwork completed for a “samensleving” contract. This is a contract that two people can enter that gives each person the rights and benefits of a spouse without the people being married. To do this we had to have an attestation from the American Consular Services stating that I am not currently married, which we then had to take to the Belgian Federal Public Service Office to have the American attestation legalized by Belgium. Now, I can tell you right now, I don’t like Brussels. It’s huge and busy and gray and dreary and dull. It’s boring and the whole political area is a dead zone. You can’t even find a place to buy a cup of coffee. There are some things to see, but as far as capital cities go, it falls flat on it’s face.

And guess who’s consular office is surrounded by extra security guards and a barbed wire perimeter? Yup, that’s right folks. This is how we Americans present ourselves to the world (in case you don’t know, Brussels is the capital of the European Union, so embassadors from everywhere live there…well, maybe not everywhere, but a shitload of places): we are the country that takes up an entire street with imported American cars (mostly Taurus SEs from what I saw), blockades it with guards and barriers, buys up all of the surrounding housing and then surrounds itself with barbed wire. I personally got a really creepy Auschwitz vibe from it. Oh and once you get inside, you get to run everything through a metal detector and x-ray machine, have your fingertips tested for explosives, and they keep your water bottle out in the lobby while you go in to do your business. It’s highly reminscent of airport security, actually.

Now you tell me, why the hell do we think we’re so special? To buy up a city block and cover it in barbed wire and metal detectors in Brussels?? Belgians smirk at their own government, do you think they give one flying fart about ours? Here’s some news for the Americans reading this:

We are a joke. The world alternately hates us or laughs at us. We are the Paris Hilton of global relations.

And I’m tired of feeling bitter and ashamed. It’s bad enough when someone in my language class hears where I’m from and chokes back a chuckle, but when I read that Dipshit W. has decreed that torture is officially a-okay or that Hillary is playing the Muslim card on Obama, or that McCain thinks the war is a fantastic idea, well then I find myself hating myself for being an American and I can’t handle that anymore.

Please don’t take this the wrong way. I am not judging anyone for who they are, aside from the politicos who willingly and knowingly represent our country and the principles that it holds dear. I do find that I’m judging, not only them, but myself.

The second my ballot leaves my fingertips and hits the bottom of the mailbox, my rubbernecking days are over.

Oh, yeah, I passed my exam, so I’m on my way to Level 3.