Politics

I have a lot of work to do. I mean A LOT of work. Structural Modeling midterm, Experimental Design midterm, Structural Modeling project proposal, APA proposal, research competency proposal…all within the next two or three weeks. So I’m going to work on that…right after I say a little something about politics.

This is not one of those posts where I’m going to rant and rave about how my side won or lost or got cheated or did the cheating or anything like that…I don’t think. Rather, I’m going to rant and rave about some other, higher order stuff that strikes me as odd and/or infuriating about politics.

“We” Won!

I saw several posts and articles in the days building up to the election about how We (Republicans) would trounce Them (Democrats). Now, after the election, those posts exclaim that “the people of these United States have spoken”, and how “the republicans will make changes, changes the people want. Wait ‘til 2012 when we finish off the libs for good!”[1]

It does not matter if you identify as Republican, Democrat, Independent, or Confused. It does not matter if you fancy yourself as a Conservative, Liberal, Moderate or Libertarian. Your political affiliation does not make you “correct” any more than your political opinion does. Political affiliation is simply aligning oneself with a bunch of other people who share similar political beliefs. It’s a declaration that you identify with Group A based on a grocery list of issues; it does not mean your grocery list is more accurate, important, relevant, or God-inspired than that of Group B’s list. So now, you can get together with your other Group A supporters and have something to talk about, something you all have in common. You can revel in how you all feel the same way…but it doesn’t make you right. It may make you Right, but that’s different.

There are, of course, similarities to be seen between this kind of fraternization and another. I’m getting images of gatherings of individuals on a holy day (Sunday), where everyone shares the same opinions and views, which are handed to them by a single point of reference, often interpreted by a single self-appointed individual for optimal comprehension and understanding. And who wouldn’t want to share in this congregation; after these gatherings, people feel so much more secure in their own Right-ness. Yes, yes, I’m talking about Game Day, and Chris Berman is the interpreter.

It is, I suppose, an interesting effect, this “Us” vs. “Them” conflict. It can be traced back through evolutionary psychology, where it was beneficial to have this divide because “We” need the resources, and “They” are trying to take the resources (resources being food, women, and beer). And we still cling to this line of thought; when “our team” wins (be it the Indianapolis Colts, the Republican Party, or the US Military), we rally around our team and feel joy-joy feelings about how cool “we” are, by association. By contrast, the opposing team is vilified, and their defeat is post hoc seen as a foregone conclusion. Of course the Patriots were going to lose. Of course the Democrats were going to lose. Of course the …targets of the US Military… were going to lose. They were Wrong. We are Right.

So what does it actually mean when your political party has…a good day…at the polls? Does it mean YOU are right? Is it validation of your personal belief system, or a cosmic thumbs-up to your moral agenda? Of course not. It just means that a whole bunch of people bothered to go vote for the same people you voted for, and fewer did so for the other guy.

Things Will Finally Be Fixed!

So the Republicans are in control of the House, and that makes a lot of people on that side of things happy. But why are they acting like the Second Coming has finally arrived? I mean, the posts I’m seeing are filled with statements about how things will finally be fixed. Seriously? Wait a second, I’m getting ramped up…

You mean to tell me that, by electing a group of people that aligned themselves with GW Bush (and his agenda) for 8 years, things are going to improve? This is a whole new brand of retarded, people. The poster child for morally bankrupt politics drove this country to new lows across the board. Scientific exploration – halted. Education – knocked back into the Stone Age (NCLB + Intelligent Design = WTF?). Economy – depressed and stagnant. Global reputation – shredded. All of this happened under the watchful eye of the Republican Party. The Republican Party, however, denies any responsibility for any of the country’s problems and lays the responsibility for all the world’s woes at the feet of President Obama. But wait.

The current state of the American economy hinges largely on housing values (I said largely, not solely). The mortgage industry collapse was in…2007-2008, with build-up years beginning in 2002. The government’s bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac happened in 2008. When did Obama take office again? Oh, that’s right. January, 2009. He wasn’t even elected until November of 2008, after most of this had already transpired.

One of the most important things Kennedy did in his brief stay in office was to start the race to the moon. This launched a flurry of interest in scientific exploration that carried the country through a period of great discovery and technological advancement. Reagan was also a keen supporter of international superiority through scientific advancement, and the beneficiaries of his reign include not only NASA but Bill Gates. Pushing the envelope of science and technology is one way in which this country has been able to truly shine on the international stage. However, when GW was in office, we (as a country led by the proxy voice of a Right-Wing Ultra-Christian) stopped striving for technological superiority, and settled, instead, for technological mediocrity. This could simply have been the country’s reflection of its leadership; if a C average is good enough for the President, why should the rest of us strive for anything more?

Speaking of education…which we are now going to do…What the Fuck? Although NCLB is really just a re-tooled version of previous legislation, the tidbits that GW implemented have essentially crippled the American public education system. Research and data show that schools with more money tend to do better on assessments of all kinds, and the converse is also true: schools with low funding have students who perform poorly on assessments of all kinds. However, under NCLB legislation, public schools that perform poorly have their funding cut. Yes, cut. Let me say that again. Poorly performing schools, who are likely under-funded, have their funding cut when they…can’t…perform…wait what?

And of course, the scientific exploration and education issues have a common area of overlap when it comes to GW’s leadership. I’m speaking of the concept of intelligent design, of which GW’s Republicans were staunch supporters. Intelligent design is the infusion of the Christian God into science, the belief that regardless of what science leads us to believe, the Universe actually works according to the whims of the Invisible Man in the Sky. If they just left it at this, I’d be OK with it. If they were willing to accept Evolution as a scientific reality and just tack on the “because God set it up that way”, I’d be OK. Really. But they don’t. They fight, tooth and nail, against Darwin’s theory, to the embattled, bitter end. And why do they do this? Because in 1650 an Archbishop in the Catholic Church named Ussher said that the world was created on October 23rd in the year 4004 BC[2]. Because of this 6,000-year-old-Earth theory (commonly called Young Earth Creationism), Darwin’s theory of evolution cannot possibly hold water because the Earth would have to be billions of years old (current estimates have it at around 4.5 billion years old). All of the actual scientific (i.e., observed, tested, verified, and validated) evidence has to be wrong, wrong, wrong, because a celibate theologian who’s been dead for almost 400 years decided to do some primitive number-crunching on a Friday night.

These are the people who are going to “fix it”? Sarah Palin, Glen Beck, and their Tea-Party patriots are going to have a positive effect on this country? If positive means going back to the feeling of moral debauchery that the Bush administration left in my mouth, I’m sorry, I have to disagree. For some reason, the words Positive and Backwards have synonymous definitions to the Conservative folks, and I just can’t support that, and I welcome anyone who would like to attempt to convince me otherwise.

What Two Years Really Looks Like

Here’s something that irritates me. Obama was handed a country that was bashed, battered, sundered, and torn in a number of ways. People in the 2008 election were tired of Republican policy and ready for a change, or at least that’s what Obama’s platform was based on. Now here we sit, two years later, and the people in the middle of the spectrum who supported Obama in 2008 have swung the other direction, and Republicans are attempting to take credit for that, claiming that the American people are tired of Obama and Pelosi and the Democratic platform.

So you’re telling me that GW Bush gets 8 years to fuck the country up, but Obama only gets two years to try to fix it? After two years, we’re passing judgment on the kind of President Obama is? I would like to ask you to think about one thing for me in this next couple of minutes: your own life. Think about where you were two years ago, in 2008. Think of all the things you wanted to do, all the goals you had, and think about the kind of person you wanted to be. Do you have that image in mind?

So…have you accomplished those goals? Are you everything you wanted to be? Is your checkbook balanced, and you’re out of debt? You’re financially stable and you’re not living paycheck to paycheck? Have you gone back to school and got that degree? Have you left that job you hate and found something better? Have you met the person you love and made a solid attempt at a good relationship, or reinvented your existing relationship to be better than it was before? Have you quit drinking, smoking, and fucking around on your wife/husband? Have you been a better father/mother to your kids, a better friend, a better spouse, a better person? Well, you’ve had two years to make change happen, so what seems to be the problem?

Is this not the way we have treated President Obama? Are we so hypocritical, each and every one of us, that we are comfortable waving our finger at the White House, while we cannot in our own lives even balance our own budgets?

What? You mean you’re not perfect? You want to tell me change takes time, and that while you still have debt, at least you’re not bouncing checks anymore? You still drink, but you quit smoking? You got a divorce, but you’re happier for it?

Oh. Change takes time. Now I get it. I understand. And I applaud the attempt and wish you luck in your goals. If there’s anything I can do for you to aid in your attempts at being better, you let me know, and I will be there for you.

Not that the American people will ever be able to get over their own collective egos to do something like that, but I can hope. As an idealist, it’s what I do.



[1] http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39982780/ns/politics-decision_2010/?GT1=43001
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Earth_creationism