Compassion for All

                    As I'm sure you are all aware, tragedy struck Newtown, Connecticut last Friday.  Everywhere you can see expressions of grief as the nation mourns the loss of twenty of the most innocent members of our society and six of their caretakers.  Yet as horrible as this tragedy was, I cannot agree with all those who have labeled the shooter a monster.
                    Adam Lanza was only twenty years old - the same age I was when I had my own crisis with my depression.  The pictures I have seen of him show a young man with wide eyes below an almost comically large forehead and full, slightly parted lips above a narrow chin, giving him a perpetually surprised expression.  Some of the news reports suggest he might have had a mild form of autism, a disease which is poorly understood, at best.  His family have expressed shock and regret for his actions.
                    This was a boy who reached a breaking point and did a monstrous thing, but I don't think that makes him a monster.  For twenty years he was a "shy, awkward boy" who was loved by his family.  A family that must now cope not only with the loss of their young relative, but also his mother, whom he shot to death before going on his rampage in the school.  And unlike the families in Newtown, they must do it not with the support, but with the condemnation of the nation bearing down on them.
                    Very few people are truly monsters.  So despite his monstrous actions, please, think twice before you label someone's cousin, nephew, or child a monster.

Hurricane Sandy

                        As you are doubtless aware, Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast yesterday.  I, and most people I know, are fine.  Most of us came through without significant property damage, and many of us never lost power, or lost power only briefly.
                        But nearly everyone included in those statements were also out of the path of the worst of the storm.  It is humbling to realize that there are parts of the country not far away from me where people have had to abandon their homes to protect their lives.  In Ocean City, a mere three hours drive away from me, Hurricane Sandy demolished beach-front property and flooded hundreds more homes.  Further north, in New York, dozens of people have lost their lives in the storm, and estimates put the property damage at twenty billion dollars.
                        One bright spot in all of this is the response of the presidential candidates to the disaster.  President Obama immediately put his campaign on hold to ensure that emergency crews had the resources they needed and that citizens in the path of the hurricane were kept as safe as possible.  Romney used his visibility at prearranged rallies to encourage people to contribute to or volunteer with relief organizations that would be helping mitigate the effects of the storm.  It is good to see that even so close to election day, the candidates can put aside their political differences to work for the safety of those affected by this natural disaster.

Warning: Political Rant Ahead

                    Okay.  I know we in the United States are in the middle of a Presidential campaign.  I know that people tend to feel very strongly about politics.  That's fine with me.  Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and frankly, of all the things you can get worked up about, the leadership of your homeland is definitely one of the better ones.  What really cheeses me off, though, is that the things that my friends and co-workers choose to harp on are either not relevant to the candidate's ability to do the job (Biden smiled too much during the debate?  Really?) or else are parroting party lines without acknowledging, much less seeming to care about, context.
                    Our electoral system isn't perfect.  I'll be the first to admit that.  But whatever deficits it may have, I'm quite certain that it was never intended to be a glorified popularity contest.  Yet that is exactly what I see unfolding around me.  Obama ads that bash Romney for his forty-seven percent comment, because it makes Romney unpopular.  Romney ads that focus on Obama's poor debate performances, because it makes Romney look better by comparison.  All around me I hear and see people talking about how this candidate was rude, or that candidate was too aggressive.
                    Whatever happened to researching the candidate's positions and making a logical, informed decision?  Is this idea merely the fevered product of my imagination?  I don't even care which candidate a person supports, as long as their conversation indicates that they have actually thought about the matter.  Unfortunately, few of my acquaintances seem to have given it even token thought.  Am I really the only one who doesn't just swallow their preferred political party's propaganda?