On Politics
In my high school Government class, we took time out of our busy day to take a quiz. This quiz wasn’t for a grade, but merely for our own edification.
We were given a series of statements and we were asked to strongly agree, agree, strongly disagree, or agree with it. After 20 such statements, we assigned point values to each answer and based on that, we learned if we were right-leaning, left-leaning, or in the middle.
I remember this very well, because I ended up dead center.
During the 2004 election, I took many such tests online, some many times over. That way, I could answer according to my mood and calculate an average score. That average was one tick to the left.
What’s the meaning of all this? Other than that I might have too much time on my hands, it shows that I may have moved slightly to the left.
But you know what? I think that it would be foolish for me to rely on quizzes and Internet tests to determine my political beliefs. So let me tell you what I believe…
I love my country. I’m a Man of the World, but I make my home in the United States (and the best part of it, too). I root hard for our Olympic team, grill and watch fireworks on the 4th of July, and I would lay down my life for it.
But to paraphrase Conn Smythe’s quote about hockey: The United States must be a great country in order to survive the fools who run it. And there a lot of fools. Oh sure, there are good people who have the best interests of their country in mind when they volunteer for public service. But they are drowned out by the chorus of the troublemakers.
A shame really, as I could use that to comfort me in the wake of those who prefer sensationalism above legislating (though I’m afraid what they would do if they turned their attention to crafting laws). You know who I’m talking about. Both liberals and conservatives have experts in speaking claptrap. Anywhere there’s a reporter, a cameraman, or an unattended microphone, you’ll find them.
You know what’s especially hair-pulling and teeth-gnashing bout this? We are all too eager to accommodate them. From the entrenched big media to bloggers (yes, bloggers are just as guilty as the MSM in this instance), we celebrate the bigmouths. Their quotes are splattered across newspapers, TV, and blogs. Then the reflexive actions of criticism and defense begin, just as loudly.
Meanwhile, great ideas are ignored. Policy debate is stifled and we all suffer because we, as an electorate, remain uninformed of what’s really important. Our democracy weakens, allowing opportunity for more troublemakers who make big promises to fix things that you or I could easily fix if we took the time and got our hands dirty.
So, to make a long story short, I’m not only moderate, but I feel that We the People can do more for ourselves. We just need to ignore the loudmouths, roll up our sleeves, and get to work.
As such, I intend to make this online journal less about cults of personality and more on ideas.
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