Seen at the San Francisco Chronicle:
If you have any doubts as to whether this political campaign season has lasted too long and soured voters on the whole political process, look at the favorable/unfavorable poll ratings of the candidates. Premier pollster Scott Rasmussen’s latest polling of likely voters nationally shows that most Democrats and Republicans have higher negative than positive poll numbers. The more we see them, the less we want them as our leader.
This reminds me of some conversation that took place at my mother-in-law’s house while I was visiting for Christmas.
Over Christmas dinner, conversation turned political, a direction I initially dreaded because of my damnyankee politics not generally being well-received in deep south Alabama, but it turned out to be quite interesting listening to seemingly typical folks from that corner of the country—people who don’t generally go online, don’t watch too much non-entertainment TV, and generally hash out their politics at civic clubs and church coffee hours.
Some quotes from the patriarchs and matriarchs of the family (with the drawl mostly edited out):
- “I’m tired of them debates. It seems like they’re just saying the same things over and over.”
- “I’d vote for Hucklebee [sic], but he’d just spend all our money. I’d vote for Romney, but he cain’t seem to make up his mind about anything. I’m tempted to vote for McClain [sic], but there’s probably something wrong with him too.”
- “I’d vote for a woman, but I can’t vote for Clinton ’cause she’s a real female dog.”
- “I’ve got no problem with them folks; but my problem with Barak Mohammed Obama [sic] is that I ain’t sure he’s a Christian.”
- “I don’t think I’m going to be able to vote for any of them. I’ll probably just stay at home.”
In fairness to those folks, Alabama isn’t exactly a hotbed of Presidential political activity, and candidates (or their campaign staff, or their advertisements) haven’t been around to dilute some of these impressions and misconceptions.
I’ve previously said that I wish government could run smoothly enough, be sufficiently efficient, and be trustworthy so that folks who want to ignore politics can safely do so. I may have to rethink that, since folks who ignore politics are still empowered to vote.
My reasoning for that statement is left as an exercise for the reader.