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Monday, May 14, 2007
What do you want to hear from politicians?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I had an interesting conversation the other day.
I had gone to Taco Mac in Duluth after work with a co-worker. We were talking to this man, he been in Atlanta for about a year and was originally from Connecticut. We talked about a lot of things: motorcycle helmets, the Fair Tax, the differences between North and South. I asked him what he thought about what was going on in politics.
“Man, I don’t even discuss politics anymore,” he replied. “I’m so sick of it all.”
“What you mean?” I asked.
“I’m sick of our politicians. Iraq, for example, it’s either ‘stay the course’ or, ‘we have lost.’ I don’t agree with Bush, but I don’t like much of what the Democrats are saying either. I have to be extreme on either one side or the other, and is the only choices I’m getting.
“No one’s talking about Social Security, no one’s talking about health care. We either believe in global warming, or you believe it’s all hocus-pocus. We’re either God-fearing Christians or heathen pagans. We are either liberal or conservative.
“Where is the middle ground?”
I thought about this for a minute. I said: “It seems to me like a politician is someone who can come up with more than one answer, or at least be able to persuade someone without beating them over the head. Have we run out of good ideas or have we just run out of politicians?”
“I don’t know,” he replied. “We cannot possibly have run out of good ideas. I know some pretty smart people, and I know some pretty good politicians. They would never run for office. The elections aren’t about who is the better candidate, the elections are about who can stay the same thing consistently and spend the most money doing it.
“Personally, I think that’s boring. And ignorant. Politics is a profitable business, I have no doubt of that. It’s all become so standard though, there’s no creativity. It’s like movies, TV, sports, cars, everything else. Everything is marketed towards what makes money, not about what is unique. Sure you fail, but your success is much better doing something new than it is doing something consistently. That’s the best way to kill off creativity.”
He had a valid point. Nobody talks about politics anymore beyond the sound bite that they heard on the radio talkshow or on the TV news program. It’s more important to tell somebody that they are wrong than to convince somebody that they are right.
To me, that makes ideas stagnant and lethargic. I think some change would be nice.
What kinds of things would you like to hear our politicians talk about?
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