Thoughts from "The Man of the Year"

I know, it's a comedy, and a rather good one at that. But then I am biased since just about anything Robin Williams does I like (after Mork and Mindy that is). I thought the movie would just me be laughing my ass off about the idea of electing a comedian President, but then I find I was actually thinking about some of the stuff that the movie brought up.

First, the actual election process. I know computers are supposed to make our lives easier, but when does that ease start getting in the way of our democratic process? Put all the safe guards in place you would like, and quite frankly in the megabytes and gigabytes of code that enables the voter to go in and push a button on a computer screen is still easy to compromise. All it takes is one programmer with an agenda (politics and agendas... imagine that!) and the results can come out as anything the said programmer wants it to be. Fact is, once the code is finalized, there is very little review of it as long as it functions. Now, combined with the fact that it is largely taboo to talk about who you actual vote for, who is to say that the election results are acurate? The government? The folks that are benefiting from those very same results? Sounds a bit fishy. But think about it, if you go in and vote for Candidate A but Candidate Y wins, the reaction is largely "oh well, my person didn't win, maybe next time." Except for the scenario of a huge popular vote landslide being overturned, who the hell would think that a popular vote difference of seven or eight percent would be anything but the democratic process at work? Apparently I would.

Secondly, the whole debate structure. I know we need order and civility in debates, and since they are televised they need to be somewhat choreographed, but come on. How many times have we all sat around listening to someone answer prescreened questions that they have had their handlers give them answers (or non-answers more often than not) that follow the party line. Are we supposed to be so naive that we don't realize that these are canned answer? Even though we have been listening to the same fucking answer from both parties for the past twenty years?

Third and last, the whole idea of the financing that goes into the campaigns. Yes, there was supposed to be campaign finance reform (in case you don't know, that largely when out the window when Sen. McCain needed to get re-elected), but regardless of how you reform it as long as the money for the campaigns and the television ads comes from lobbies and the national party coffers there won't be any real reform. We are a capitalistic economy, but does that mean that our government has to be a capitalistic entity also? Wouldn't it be nice to actually be able to elect someone on the basis of what they think and what they can do other than throw mud? Maybe I'm dreamin'.

We won't get into the actual "who" we are ever electing, that is something for another time.

Anyway, get a bowl of popcorn and a copy of "The Man of the Year" and see where it takes your mind.