Democrats have lost mainstream America

Dear Joe,

I am reading your book, Deer Hunting with Jesus, and enjoying the descriptions while being infuriated by your personal opinions. Oddly enough, you miss the point over and over. You're clueless.

Let me give you some background on me. My parents are from New York City and are Jews. My mother was raised by Eastern European immigrants to be a Communist and to the left of Che Guevara. My father was raised by religious parents who were more conservative. My mother was a social worker turned special education teacher (who still works at 73 to pay the $700 a month for my medical insurance.) My father was an engineer turned trial attorney and who is retired and living in Tucson. We are hardly rednecks, yes?

I was born and raised in Los Angeles. I went to Denmark as an exchange student at 17 and traveled and lived overseas several times. I read voraciously. I am a teacher with eight years of university education, four years undergrad, two for the teaching credential and two for the master's degree.

I no longer read newspapers or news magazines (unless trapped in a doctor's waiting room with a four-year-old copy of Time). I watch CNN's Lou Dobbs religiously and listen to talk radio (including Rush Limbaugh.) As a result of growing up in Los Angeles, I speak fluent Spanish without any American accent (my Hispanic last name comes from a South American I married while teaching in Paraguay) and taught my first 10 years in the "bilingual" program. My friends who didn't speak Spanish couldn't get hired while the Los Angeles Unified School District was recruiting teachers from Spain, Mexico, South America and Puerto Rico.

I am a registered die-hard Republican and understand 99% of where your redneck friends are coming from. I agree with most of them on most issues. Having been an AFDC caseworker after college, I want to end welfare payments to young women and give more money to truly disabled people and the elderly living in poverty, so I don't want to dismantle the system entirely.

Now, how can a Jewish woman from an urban highly educated intellectual family like mine believe in the same things your rednecks do? In case you think I'm an anomaly, all my white and Asian friends, neighbors and co-workers agree with me. If you think the Republican party's supporters are made up of rich white men, and disenfranchised poor whites you are sadly mistaken.

When I hear anything out of the mouths of "liberals" and Democrats it is always on the side of illegal aliens and the undeserving. Hillary "No woman is illegal" Clinton and Barack (friend of Rev. Wright, et al., wife Michelle who has never been proud to be American) Obama do not represent me. I am not thrilled with McCain but he's getting my vote.

I could go on endlessly but I am writing to let you know that the left in this country has gone so far to one side that they've lost mainstream Americans.

Regards,
Lisa
Los Angeles

P.S. I went to the emergency room on Friday and sat six hours vomiting and writhing in pain while uninsured criminal gang members with gunshot wounds were attended to. How did I know they were uninsured? I talked to their parents. I finally went home and thought I'd die in comfort in my bed. I am still in pain and in the process of getting a diagnosis. More than 30 (I believe 38) hospitals have been closed in Los Angeles County in the past 15 years due to the  influx of illegals. Angry? I'm enraged and the Conservatives seem to hear me better than the liberals.

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Dear Lisa,

I was writing about one group of people in one town that exemplify one segment -- albeit a very large one -- of heartland America and our class system. Readers often read much more into what they read than they take away from it.

At any rate, you are a a fascinating and unique specimen as a voter and an American.

Thank you for taking your valuable time to write. I truly appreciate that.

In art and labor,

Joe