The Politics of Fear

For the last couple of months, I've been subjected to a steady bombardment of mail and phone calls (both live and automated) from both sides of the Jim Gerlach/Lois Murphy congressional election. Virtually all of it has involved the worst kind of mudslinging, and I had no idea at all about what either one of them really stood for until the local newspaper published an article about a debate between the two. The debate itself seemed to primarily involve mudslinging, but the newspaper conveniently summarized the two candidates' positions on the more significant issues at the end of the article, finally providing me with some real information.

At this point, I'm sick to death of both of them, and would vote for anyone who isn't one of them. If there's any third party candidate running against them, you can bet that's who is going to get my vote. It really doesn't matter, since one of them is going to be elected anyway, but I'm going to make my statement, for what it's worth. If either one of them had taken the higher road, that would most likely be the candidate who would've gotten my vote.

I have three separate points here. The first is that I'm tired of all the advertising done to tell us how evil the opposing candidate is. If any candidate is more focused on his/her opponent's flaws than on what they personally bring to the table, they've lost me already. I won't vote for candidates like that and I'd encourage you to do the same.

My second point is that there is no reason to spend millions on election campaigns. Wouldn't it be better to simply make a summary of each candidate's position on the key issues publicly available (the newspaper and a web site, perhaps) shortly before the election, and let the candidates stand or fall on the merits of their positions? Set a word limit for each of them (so they don't write a whole frickin' book) and let them focus their efforts on concisely and persuasively making their case. It would save a lot of time, effort, and cash, and not leave the candidates owing their souls to special interests just so they can have the money necessary to run for office. Maybe the way to go is to allow them three opportunities to do this. One could be a month before the election to make their initial case, another one week later to allow a rebuttal to what the opponents said the prior week, and one last time to say whatever else they feel needs to be said. Why do we need any more than that?

My third point is that I've had enough of the "two party system". There is no "two party system". There can be as many parties as there are opinions; it's just that two main parties have evolved, and I'm not happy with either one of them right now. There's a perception that you can't get elected in this country unless you sign up with one team or the other. There's a perception that voting for an independent is a wasted vote because they have no chance of being elected. Let's prove them wrong and elect more independents. I often vote for third party candidates just to make the point that I'm not happy with the existing parties. If enough of us do that, we'll get better choices. I don't want to vote for the lesser evil; I want to vote for the best candidate for the job. It would be a lot easier for good people to run for public office in the first place if they didn't need a party's support to do it, and it's only that expensive to do because we make it that way. I'd like to see that change.