Dirty politics is like cheatgrass. It takes over if you let it.

Some of us with deep roots in Wyoming were raised to vote for the best candidate rather than party. As a kid, I stuffed campaign envelopes for Republicans and Democrats. My parents supported people from different parties and taught me to be proud of Wyoming for electing excellence in character.

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So, it made me feel sick when the attack postcard against Cody mayor and House District 24 hopeful Matt Hall arrived in my mail. Kind of like watching cheatgrass make its way over our foothills, it twists my gut. The card was full of red flags — polarizing propaganda that should not find a purchase in our common-sense culture.

The flyer claimed that Mayor Hall was woke. When I hear “woke” used these days, it sounds like a polarizing term, the tar and feathers of a conservative criticism of liberals. It was meant to deliver a fatal blow to Hall’s candidacy without a single piece of local evidence to support the charge. So how did it happen that the word “woke” is used to divide people into “us” vs. “them?” It is odd that being awake is considered bad.

Woke began as a term used by American parents out of concern for their children. Black kids were in danger of being treated with cruelty or disrespect that could hurt their souls or escalate to threaten their lives.  Their parents would tell their kids to “stay woke” when moving in public. These parents knew that their children could not be carefree — they had to always cultivate situational awareness.

This is an American term, born out of the American experience. I feel for any parent who knows that their child has a target on their back either for their class, the color of their skin or the shape of their eyes. Looking at American history, “woke” means that a person is aware that Americans walk in this world with different degrees of power. That parents need to arm their children with caution according to the targets on their backs.

If we look past the cheatgrass of an anonymous flyer that calls someone woke and examine our roots, we remember that when Wyoming wrote its constitution it was the most woke state of the region. It gave women the right to vote. To be from Wyoming meant to work for equality.

The flyer also photoshopped a picture of Matt Hall kneeling next to top Democrats Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer. When propaganda ties a lifelong Republican like Hall to Pelosi, it’s just hogwash. The people writing the smear have no local evidence to criticize. In the cut out of Mayor Hall on the mailer, you don’t see the police chief who was next to him on that day the photo was taken, and who spoke with integrity and strength about the responsibility the police have with their powers to use force.

The authors of the flyer don’t know us, nor do they care about us. They are mocking the idea that black lives are grievable and tarring Hall for showing respect for a legal principle of justice for all here in Cody.

It’s time to return to our roots. Otherwise, the Wyoming we were raised in politically is going to get taken over with this empty cheatgrass. It debases our local memories and community spirit.

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