Sunday, September 05, 2004
Why I like John Kerry... and why I hate humanity
"I actually did vote for the 87 billion dollars, before I voted against it." Man, this quote has made the rounds, hasn't it? The Republicans have been bashing Kerry for being wishy-washy, long-winded, and a flip-flopper. I, on the other hand, believe that this quote demonstrates why you should like Kerry too.
Aren't you sick of being treated like a moron by politics? Both parties realize that the American people are simple-minded sheep. So the republicans portray Kerry as a person with no convictions. And the democrats try to deflect this by portraying him as a war hero. They don't actually address the issue of WHY he changed his mind, because the American public wouldn't want to listen to the explanation. And even if they did, they probably wouldn't even understand. They don't want to listen, they want generalizations and sound bites, and they want to listen to whatever they already believe. Yeah, we all do this, but some a lot more than others.
Like all things in life, things a lot more complex than they seem on the surface. Kerry voted for the 87 billion at first because he wanted the Iraq aid to go through as quickly as possible. He voted against it secondly because of the extra riders that went along with the legislation, earmarking money for companies like Halliburton. Kerry has had a history of voting for what seem to be opposite causes, but when you look deeper, he has usually had a good reason for doing so.
Doesn't it seem that most politicians basically vote on a bill based on what the title is? If you had a bill called "Saving babies", most congressmen would vote for it; they wouldn't care that the bill cost 13 trillion dollars and saved one baby's life, or that it enacted this plan of saving babies by taking them away from their parents and putting them into a federally controlled nursery that released them at age 18. But the fact that John Kerry seems to actually READ the bills and understand their funding and deeper impact, and the fact that he doesn't give a fuck that he might be voting against "saving babies" and the fact that he tells the truth about his voting record, and the fact taht he came straight out and said that he voted for and against something should tell US, that he 1) actually does have strong convictions, 2) is practical, 3) isn't insulting the American intelligence by pretending he was always for the 87 billion, or always against it. Like anything else in the world, there are causes and effects, and looking deeper into the problem usually results in better solutions. We expect our doctors to get to the roots of our diseases, we expect lawyers to do the best research to help our cases, we expect mechanics to fix the gas leak, not just fill up the tank again. But not with politicians. We'd rather hear "everything's going to be fine!", as long as it comes from a tall, handsome, married white male.
Of course, as soon as he said it, nobody wanted to hear the explanation why. The stupid public (and the media that knows how stupid the public is) jumped all over it. For once, somebody didn't insult our collective intelligence, and all the dumb people just got upset. "We don't get it!" was the outcry.
But it's not that simple either. Take our friend GW; Bush recently said that "the war on terror couldn't be won." I actually thought Bush was brain dead, but it showed to me he actually understood what was going on; he was telling the truth, he wasn't being political. Of course, the democrats jumped all over him, saying it was a defeatist attitude, and Bush had to come out the next day saying "we are winning, and we will win." Thank you, everybody, one and all. Maybe Bush isn't actually that terrible, he just makes himself look stupid to appeal to the common man! It's so brilliant!
Anyway, we blame politicians for being lying snakes. But then things like this happen, and you should all realize, that most of American wants to be lied to. The politicians are just giving us what they want.
And that's the problem with humanity. Sure, we could have politicians that didn't talk down to the public, but then the stupid people would be, to quote the Simpsons, "furrowing their brows in a vain attempt to understand the situation". And since stupid people make up humanity, they have all the power. So what can you do? Well, voting for Kerry probably won't change that. By the time he gets to the debates in October, the PR campaign will have molded him into a good robot, who doesn't say things like that anymore. Just like the PR campaign for Bush doesn't let him say a damn thing that hasn't been vetted at least 100 times. Some people are bad public speakers. Doesn't make him a bad leader, just makes him say things like "fool me can't get fooled again!" Ok, I got off-topic. Well, I don't know what we can do. The media is convinced we're all morons, the politicians are convinced we're all morons. And most importantly, I'm convinced we're all morons. The question is, can a bunch of (hopefully) smarter politicians manipulate a bunch of average stupid people to do the right thing for the wrong, dumb reasons? Well, I think it's our only hope.
Aren't you sick of being treated like a moron by politics? Both parties realize that the American people are simple-minded sheep. So the republicans portray Kerry as a person with no convictions. And the democrats try to deflect this by portraying him as a war hero. They don't actually address the issue of WHY he changed his mind, because the American public wouldn't want to listen to the explanation. And even if they did, they probably wouldn't even understand. They don't want to listen, they want generalizations and sound bites, and they want to listen to whatever they already believe. Yeah, we all do this, but some a lot more than others.
Like all things in life, things a lot more complex than they seem on the surface. Kerry voted for the 87 billion at first because he wanted the Iraq aid to go through as quickly as possible. He voted against it secondly because of the extra riders that went along with the legislation, earmarking money for companies like Halliburton. Kerry has had a history of voting for what seem to be opposite causes, but when you look deeper, he has usually had a good reason for doing so.
Doesn't it seem that most politicians basically vote on a bill based on what the title is? If you had a bill called "Saving babies", most congressmen would vote for it; they wouldn't care that the bill cost 13 trillion dollars and saved one baby's life, or that it enacted this plan of saving babies by taking them away from their parents and putting them into a federally controlled nursery that released them at age 18. But the fact that John Kerry seems to actually READ the bills and understand their funding and deeper impact, and the fact that he doesn't give a fuck that he might be voting against "saving babies" and the fact that he tells the truth about his voting record, and the fact taht he came straight out and said that he voted for and against something should tell US, that he 1) actually does have strong convictions, 2) is practical, 3) isn't insulting the American intelligence by pretending he was always for the 87 billion, or always against it. Like anything else in the world, there are causes and effects, and looking deeper into the problem usually results in better solutions. We expect our doctors to get to the roots of our diseases, we expect lawyers to do the best research to help our cases, we expect mechanics to fix the gas leak, not just fill up the tank again. But not with politicians. We'd rather hear "everything's going to be fine!", as long as it comes from a tall, handsome, married white male.
Of course, as soon as he said it, nobody wanted to hear the explanation why. The stupid public (and the media that knows how stupid the public is) jumped all over it. For once, somebody didn't insult our collective intelligence, and all the dumb people just got upset. "We don't get it!" was the outcry.
But it's not that simple either. Take our friend GW; Bush recently said that "the war on terror couldn't be won." I actually thought Bush was brain dead, but it showed to me he actually understood what was going on; he was telling the truth, he wasn't being political. Of course, the democrats jumped all over him, saying it was a defeatist attitude, and Bush had to come out the next day saying "we are winning, and we will win." Thank you, everybody, one and all. Maybe Bush isn't actually that terrible, he just makes himself look stupid to appeal to the common man! It's so brilliant!
Anyway, we blame politicians for being lying snakes. But then things like this happen, and you should all realize, that most of American wants to be lied to. The politicians are just giving us what they want.
And that's the problem with humanity. Sure, we could have politicians that didn't talk down to the public, but then the stupid people would be, to quote the Simpsons, "furrowing their brows in a vain attempt to understand the situation". And since stupid people make up humanity, they have all the power. So what can you do? Well, voting for Kerry probably won't change that. By the time he gets to the debates in October, the PR campaign will have molded him into a good robot, who doesn't say things like that anymore. Just like the PR campaign for Bush doesn't let him say a damn thing that hasn't been vetted at least 100 times. Some people are bad public speakers. Doesn't make him a bad leader, just makes him say things like "fool me can't get fooled again!" Ok, I got off-topic. Well, I don't know what we can do. The media is convinced we're all morons, the politicians are convinced we're all morons. And most importantly, I'm convinced we're all morons. The question is, can a bunch of (hopefully) smarter politicians manipulate a bunch of average stupid people to do the right thing for the wrong, dumb reasons? Well, I think it's our only hope.
# posted by Stuart @ 1:33 AM 
