People and Politics

Mark Twain once said, "Politicians are like dirty diapers; the need to be changed often and for the same reason," although seemingly childish, the man might have a solid point. For so many years, politics have been a battle of the right and the left, Democrats and Republicans, Liberals and conservatives, but honestly putting all the media has told us aside, what do the essentials of politics boil down to?

So many people in America often times never take the time to study politics themselves and become familiar with the issues at hand. According to Peoplepress.org approximately 25% of Americans believe that what happens in Washington does personally affect them. That's 1 in 4 Americans.

Another ironic fact is that, while about 90% of Americans are registered to vote, only 53% consider themselves well versed on the relevant political topics. That means that almost 38% of registered voters are at the polls to fill in the boxes, slap on a "I Voted Today" sticker, and walk out the door. So you might ask yourself: what could they possibly be doing at the polls? They are simply voting with their party's choice, many Americans will simply vote with whatever party they have always voted for. Its gotten to the point where Politicians can count on certain states voting for them; for example, the south has always been called the solid south for their solid history of voting Democrat, thus the Democrats can count on solid votes from that region.



With all these facts and statistics you might be wondering where I'm going with all of this. The point that I'm trying to illustrate is that Americans have shifted from voting for the most appealing candidate to the one that their particular political party has chosen. The whole point of America from the beginning was to elect and official that would reflect the wishes of the people, and be held to accountability by them. If the people didn't like what was going on, they would impeach their official and elect a new one. It was never meant for the people to elect a leader, then just buckle up for the next term and sortof, grin and bear it, no matter what happens, rather the leader is subject to the people.

Lets take a moment to look specifically at this current political race, its nothing short of a mess, the Republicans praise Clint Eastwood's rather confusing monologue to an empty chair, and the Democratic Party has said virtually nothing regarding balancing the budget, in case anybody has forgotten, we are still16 trillion dollars in debt. Both parties seem to be very excited about "moving forward" and restoring america to its former greatness, and yet both parties seem fairly vague about how exactly they are going to bring this about. Romney's tactic of using "trickle down economics" sounds brilliant but in order for this plan to work you have to have people willing to invest in the economy in order for the money to trickle down. Obama's plan is not much better unfortunately, his plan is to invest money into the economy in order to grow it. This has resulted in a mass production in the auto industry and while it sounds like a good idea in theory, people can only only buy so many cars.

In conclusion, while both platforms advocate a new and better America, both of them a little to vague for me to place any trust in either of them. Romney has raised the question "are we better off then we were 4 years ago?" a fairly legitimate claim, but where is the counter offer? Whats his plan to help improve America? He seems a little too shallow for my personal taste, and as Dave Letterman put it  "Mitt Romney looks like a guy modeling briefs on a package of underwear"  well put Mr. Letterman. As for President Obama, what is his defense of that question? Sure, Obama has killed Osama bin Laden, and revived GM Inc. as Vice President Joe Biden reminded us for the several thousandth time. But as an honest question, what has Obama done for the country exactly? It would be nice to have a checklist anyways.

In conclusion, whatever your political stance might be one of those men will be in the office in January. Whether it be Governor Romney or President Obama, one of these men will be in charge of the country for the next 4 years. It seems like the key question in this election is not "who is the divinely chosen leader to bring America back to its greatness" it's more a question of which is the lesser evil, Romney or Obama? It's something to think about anyways.