Scott,

I have to disagree with your descriptions of us all as puppets. Everybody has free will, and they can vote for whomever or whatever they wish.

From what I can tell, the general consensus in this class is "the system is broken, and is irreparably fixed." Perhaps I am an idealist, but I do not think this is the case. The system has problems; there is no denying that. However, the system only got that way because one of two things happened. Either the people voted to make it that way, or we voted for representatives who made it that way. In both of these situations, the people of this country had the power to change it, and they used that power.

This same thing can happen again. Of course, it will be difficult. I have been canvassing this school all week and have been asking people to register to vote, and I have been hearing a lot of people say "I don't want to vote because it doesn't make a difference." I think this is how the system is broken. The system is broken because the people who decide on the system have tuned out and covered their eyes and ears.

John and Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. stuck their necks out, and they got killed. This is true. But then you have to compare that to people who stuck their necks out and actually changed something. Rosa Parks stuck her neck out on a small bus in Alabama. Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton stuck their necks out. These brave women made a difference. The people in the revolt at Stonewall in New York, the peaceful demonstrators lining up in the south willing to get shot with fire hoses, and Mahatma Gandhi all stuck their necks out.

You can't say that anybody who tries to make a change gets shot down. The world is changed by people who are willing to get shouted down or shot down. When people see that they have a leader like this, they will line up behind the person, and that group will make a difference. The country and the system are changed by people who care. It is changed because people are willing to change it.

-Britt