I loathe the election season, but without government, life would be more chaotic than it is. So it seems that these politicos, none of whom I trust as far as I could pull a locomotive, are a necessary evil.
I firmly believe that there are no good answers at the extreme end of any spectrum, yet this whole election process serves best to galvanize the public to one pole or the other. Each camp hurls accusations at the other, and tries to spin the events the show themselves in the best light, but there is no truth to be found anywhere.
The Republicans try their best to paint Obama as a narcissistic and a self proclaimed Demi-God. Meanwhile the Democrats suppose to convince us that McCain is just part of the same old conservative show. Neither of these assertions holds water, anymore than cheesecloth. I heard one conservative talk show host try to make up some mileage on the fact that a couple of old women switched flags after Hillary was spanked out the picture; and you really have to give me a break on this one. Those two adamantly feminist crones would have thrown in with the Nazis if they'd had a woman on the ticket.
If you want to know for whom you're voting, then you need to go back before they began posturing. Obama, in his writing and pre campaign comments has exposed himself to be a sensitive and humble man with a very liberal new world viewpoint. Here is a man who had to get permission from his wife to run for President. I am not joking. I paraphrase Mrs. Obama when I say, “Alright dear, you may run for President if you like, but you must quit smoking before you do.”
On the other side, McCain has a 26-year career of being an irascible curmudgeon. He has butted heads with whomever he chooses in order to do what he wishes. I am certain that in his mind, he has never been proven wrong.
So there you have your choices, a charming but essentially weak Socialist, or a bully
The sad thing is, though, that it really doesn't make a big hill of beans for whom we vote. The president is only one person, and no matter who they think they are, they can't swim against the tide for long.
It takes an obscene amount of money to be elected to an office; especially at the Federal level. Candidates and incumbents from both sides of the aisle take their money from the same people and entities, who are largely paying for influence and favor. Who among us is foolish enough to believe that these politicians would take this lucre from the elite among us, then not serve them and expect to receive their support in the future. They are corrupt, not stupid. There is a reason why we essentially have no middle class left in this country.
More upsetting than all of this is that the whole thing reminds me of everything that is wrong with us. We have deadly serious social problems in this culture and are in effect being attacked from all sides, but few among us have the good sense to realize that we are in a war. We have largely become a nation of people who reason by emotion. Most of us having a fully functional Pre-fontal Lobe use it only to justify our own actions and attitudes. We react largely out of fear and anger when faced with the results of complicated social issues, like so many children trying to escape the bogeyman. Some of us, however, have risen to the point where we can muster some good, old fashion moral outrage against that which we do not understand and have convinced ourselves that we would never do. Most of us, though, are just self-absorbed isolationists, who have learned to live in denial of that which we believe we can't change; victims, like as many women who seek the comfort of sympathizers and rail for vindication. Rarely do we take responsibility for our own lives, the choices we make, or the actions we take. Everything is someone else's fault or blame.
We are not living in the golden age of reason, and I don't see any great change on the horizon. When this election is over, we will say hooray or boo, and maybe oh well, but will eventually turn our heads down and scuttle back to our little holes, where we will let the world go by. Only occasionally will we pop out and manage to point a finger at someone else, before hiding again.
I live in this mess, and being unable to escape it, have been victimized by it. I am not willing to be a victim, though, but having no authority or platform by which to change this place, I can only pick up my trumpet and blow.
