Covid, DNC & Moving Forward

After spending a great time in Atlanta at the Women Marines Convention, I flew home…and came down with Covid. I’ve taken great pains over the past four years to avoid it, but the damn virus found me. It’s surging again, and it’s brutal.

Stay safe everyone.

Coming out of my Covid stupor, the Democratic National Convention was just the elixir I needed.

Just a month ago many Americans were plodding ahead, unexcited about the future and dreading the outcome of our Project 2025 future. Today we are excited, energized, and eager to get on with it.

In four weeks, we have begun to heal the trauma and fatigue of the 2016 election and said, “Hell no, not this time Satan!” The DNC party reclaimed freedom, the flag, and yes, even football.

Hello Ted Lasso and positive masculinity!

I avoid politics in my writing but I’m making an exception with this post.

I’ve been a registered Independent my adult life. That started changing when President Obama was vilified in 2010 for trying to pass the Affordable Care Act.

Working as a real estate agent in Michigan, my last buyer’s house was being foreclosed. His wife had a “preexisting condition,” so she didn’t qualify for a health care policy.

After a medical emergency, her bills totaled nearly $1 million. Her small business owner husband had to declare bankruptcy and withdraw $40K from his 401K to buy a house for cash to put a roof over his family’s head (and thankfully, you could still buy a decent small house in Dearborn, Michigan in 2010).

Then in 2015, Donald Trump, one of President Obama’s most vocal critics announced his candidacy. Unlike a classmate of mine who said he’d “grow into the job, I have faith,” my gut told me otherwise.

That July candidate Trump, upset that John McCain didn’t try to kill the Affordable Care Act, said this about him: “He’s not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.”

In 2018, the Women Marines Convention was held in Washington, DC. Arizona Senator John McCain had recently passed from brain cancer and was laying in state at the Capitol building. My Marine buddy and I were touring nearby at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

A USA TODAY photographer asked us our opinions about John McCain. I didn’t always agree with his politics, but we praised his military service and veteran advocacy. The photo below ended the article.

Deborah Barfield Barry, USA TODAY ~ August 31, 2018

Which brings me back to the political present. Like Oprah, as a registered Independent I’m left to consider my options this election season.

The Republican party has followed Trump’s lead and is denigrating the service of the other party’s candidate. They paint an ominous future though they are trying to backpedal from Project 2025. They’ve rejected a bipartisan border bill so Trump can use the issue for his campaign. They’ve appointed conservative judges to the Supreme Court who overturned Roe v Wade.

The Democratic party has reclaimed freedom: pride in our service, our flag, our country, and our choice.

This election, I’m voting for joy and optimism about the future.