Thoughts on Mccain vs. Obama, Final Run
Comments (0) Until the last two months I thought the the DNC’s strategy of pushing a black or female candidate, when what we needed was a sure victory, was a mistake, but it looks like they are pulling it off. Not the landslide I’d hoped for, but if all goes well in the congressional elections we might have a chance to see people’s belief in the the government and society they are a part of restored. If nothing else, I think people might get the idea that letting corporations and banks weild their rather considerable power with impunity is a bad idea.
Although I think Obama is more of a pragmatist than an ideologue, the reason I can get behind Obama now as opposed to a couple of months ago does come down to his ideology. I have no doubt that both candidates sincerely believe what they say about their political and economic philosophies. I have no doubt that the Bushes and Cheneys of the political scene believe what they say as well. The ideology of the right, however, seems peculiarly self-serving. It is very convenient to believe in ‘free trade’ and a hands off approach to governing business when you enrich yourself in the process. It is very convenient to support foreign adventures when they enrich your friends and political contributors. What benefit comes to a rich Ivy League man like Obama by ‘spreading the wealth around’? By putting the interests of the common people first? None. After tolerating self serving ideology from our leaders for almost forty years, might we actually elect a public servant?
Not that I don’t have misgivings – the logo, the abstractions and buzzwords – but it was inevitable that the MTV generation would have it’s candidate sooner or later and they are fully immersed in ‘branding’, it’s what they respond to. I’ve tried to look beneath the surface with Obama and no matter how he appeals to people in big speeches, when he gets away from all that and just talks, he seems like a nuts and bolts kind of guy, a craftsman, as opposed to an ideologue. IMO that’s a good thing.
The question remains about the fairness of our elections, though, if there is fixing or cheating going on, from either party or some other agency, fixing could be transparent with electronic voting machines that have no voting receipt. One of the many reasons I support the Democrats is that the effort to mandate a paper trail for e-voting machines came from party leaders on their side. The Republicans opposed it as a unit, claiming it was ‘unnecessary’. After they had been caught cheating in the presidential race, we witnessed one election after another where republicans won by a fraction of a percent, the odds of winning so many elections by that small of a margin have to be one in a million. The country is divided as it always is but why it would be exactly evenly divided is beyond me. Maybe there’s a mathematical model that might reassure me that given two options and relatively equal stimulus towarss both, a large group will divide almost equally? It seems unlikely.
Themocracy