Slash and burn politics
Listen to this articleI have yet to watch any of the three debates between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. There isn’t anything either could say to sway me to vote for one over the other. Neither will receive my vote.
Political promises mean nothing. Every presidential candidate makes them only to deliver on far fewer than they make. Why? Because our leaders find it much easier to make blanket promises than to deliver on said promises.
It will be the same with this election primarily because of the slash and burn campaigns of both major candidates. Does anyone really believe Congress will work with Trump and build a wall and deport Muslims? If you do, you failed your HS government class.
Does anyone really believe Hillary will compromise with the GOP on matters of racial and police matters, minimum wage, or education? If she does, she sells out her supporters. Do you think the GOP hardliners will cave on gay marriage, marijuana, or abortion? If you do, you are HIGH as a kite.
This campaign has become so ugly and personal it has spread far beyond the candidates and well into the voters. Do you think this will change when we all wake up on November 9th and learn the results? You can’t expect to make the deeply personal attacks on people who think and believe differently than you to be forgotten just because the election is over. The losing side will have angry voters who will urge, even demand retribution on all levels of their elected congressional leaders just so they can come back in another four years for a rematch.
America is in a state of decline, but it is not so much an economic one as much as it is a social one. Decency is laughed at and has been replaced with deliberate smears based on lies to which when pointed out are laughed at by the people who were caught. When all else fails, bring up more of the past or just make it all up and see how gullible the public is.
Hillary Clinton will be our next president at this rate. Donald Trump and his blind supporters can live in their secret world of denial and conspiracy, but the fact is, she is kicking his butt (actually, he is kicking his own when he isn’t sticking his foot in it, but that seems like a personal attack on my part).
All that remains to be seen is the fallout. Do Democrats take control of both houses? How long and how deliberate will they gloat and rub it in? Will the GOP dig in its heels and block anything and everything they can while Hillary rules the nest? The answer to all of this is yes. How do I know? Because it is done every day and has been playing out now for 18 months.
Congress will be the only body of government with lower approval ratings than Hillary over the course of her first term and yet they will continue to be re elected at a 90 percent clip. Why is this? Because while most Americans hold Congress in incredibly low light, they tend to hold their own congressional representative in a strong light. Voters now expect the rest of the country to just believe as they do rather than listen and find common ground.
So where does this leave all of us? Once the dust and pageantry of the election and inauguration settles, most of us will go back to remaining ignorant of the issues and fail to stay on top of DC politics. By 2019, another list of GOP candidates will emerge, some familiar, some unknown, and the slashing and burning will start all over again.
Unless the GOP can unite behind one or two people and make them familiar and likable enough to the American public before all the shenanigans resume, we will be witnessing another national election that leaves many of us wondering how much longer do we have as a nation before it all comes crashing down on us?
Jim is a life long resident of California and retired school teacher with 30 years in public education. Jim earned his BA in History from CSU Chico in 1981 and his MA in Education from Azusa Pacific University in 1994. He is also the author of Teaching The Teacher: Lessons Learned From Teaching. Jim considers himself an equal opportunity pain in the ass to any political party, group, or individual who looks to profit off of hypocrisy. When he is not pointing out the conflicting words and actions of our leaders, the NFL commissioner, or humans in general, he can be found riding his bike for hours on end while pondering his next article. Jim recently moved to Camarillo, CA after being convinced to join the witness protection program.