I know why I'm angry. I know why my friends are angry. I know why my relatives are angry.

I and my friends do not understand why progressive politicians cannot find a way to communicate the usefulness and moral correctness of expansive, inclusive social and legal polices. My mom and siblings, on the other hand, hate that social and legal policies are not more clearly, unavoidably paternalistic. Each side believes law and politics should work toward different ends.

We are disappointed. While we all have our reasons, it comes down to bemoaning a lack of leadership from anywhere. The mythology of the American Dream is crumbling under the weight of expectation and the hard blows of reality. Yet, all politicians keep throwing the trite sayings out there as if it's 1980 and we all have huge, padded shoulders to bolster our image as giants.

The liberals, hippies and yippies of the 60s and 70s decided to put on tie died t-shirts and "turn on and tune out," leaving the stiff squares to keep their ties on and take over elected office. Sitting outside a building may make you feel like you're part of a movement and be a great PR move, but it doesn't change how the system works or who works in those systems. Now these people sell enlightenment and spiritual renovation as if it will redress political and social inequity.

That airy fairy stuff doesn't change anything, so they're angry.

Meanwhile, the suits adopted the style and the music of that wilding age, but kept their focus on getting inside the power structure. They set up foundations to create public policy and encouraged young people who couldn't afford to slide out of reality to join them in building a new world order. Conservatives' realistic sense of time and power allowed them to create an intricate structure and use the disinterest and distress of progressives to slip into every aspect of politics. While liberals argued over whether or not to join the Democratic Party or get all Greenish, Republicans were looking for handsome figureheads.

Once the GOP found Reagan, liberal politics was doomed. The smooth, believable, comforting lies of absolutism created an atmosphere of false security and false hope. Now that Reagan is gone, the consequence of all those lies doesn't sit so well. Conservatives want that feeling back, that sense of time working in their favor. But, as the financial crisis illustrates, time is against Ayn Rand-like assertions of strength through ideology.

So, mom, who loves her hard line apologists, is mad.

It's not that no one has what s/he wants, it's that The US has no coherent identity, no common goal. Government has devolved into a way station for future careers as power brokers and wealthy isolationists. We want the same thing: an encompassing view of possibility, one that includes different opinions but works for as many citizens as possible.

We want a country that is like our homes. The food expands to fit the number of guests and no matter how much we disagree, over dinner, we still sit down for dessert and laugh.

Compartmentalizing is just another word for denial.

For many years I made excuses for my family. I kept saying things like,"Really, they're good people, but they just can't accept what lies beyond their experience." I was calm, non judgmental and being eaten up from the inside.

Finally it dawned on me that they were hateful. They hate lots of things and loads of people, people they work with, people they go to church with and family members who don't agree with them. I don't use the word "hate" lightly but I don't have another word for whatever motivates their behavior.

They go to church, pride themselves on being good Americans and great Catholics. They are also openly racist, sexist and crass enough to send and tell jokes that rely on laughing at a punchline that defines Hillary Clinton and/or Michelle Obama as a whore. The "jokes" about Barack Obama are worse.

People like this are willfully blind to the injury they cause and intentionally ignorant of a larger world.

These people are dismissive and mean...and they are my family. I have to deal with them, but I don't have to support them. I don't have to engage the adults but I can be polite. I can be kind to the children and well mannered with adults. Beyond that, I have nothing to give.

If the writer's other siblings are not contributing to the parents' financial situation, the only way to get them to step up is to simply not send money anymore. Get a loan agreement written up, but unless the writer intends to wait until the parents die and sue for money owed, what's the point? Money loaned is money given; love can't be purchased.

If after all this time, your family doesn't see how personal politics can be, how their decisions are affecting your life, then you are powerless to improve their insight. No amount of talk from someone inside the family will change their views. They will think what they think regardless of your actions. Maybe they have to see the same story told by someone else, at some distance to even consider their actions. Even then, they might shift their position only slightly and not enough or in time enough to help you.

Money is the substitute for and sign of love and devotion for some people. They don't recognize the difference between demanding fealty and asking for love. There's nothing to be done about that; you can't make someone love you anymore than you can make someone see you.

The writer's only power is in retreating to safety. In this case retreat means no longer giving money. Perhaps simply telling the parents and the siblings you can't afford it anymore or just stop mailing the checks. At some point we have to stand up for ourselves. We begin by not handing the people who injure us a blunt object to do just that.