Democracy in action

A week ago, I found myself staring at my pre-absentee ballot (Government: “Jump through our hoop.” Me: Okay.”) for this winter’s upcoming presidential primary, torn between checking the box marked “Democrat” and the box marked “Republican.” Which one am I? While agonizing over this question seemed a little like trying to choose between hemlock and arsenic, I accepted the fact that I had to do this because I’m too vocally opinionated to not vote when the opportunity presents itself. Sometimes I hate me.

On one hand, I have the Democrats, represented by Hilary Clinton and Barrack Obama. In light of the recent failures of their last few campaign stratagems, the “People Love a Whiny Internet-Inventing Sore Loser Maneuver” and the “I’m Not George Bush Gambit,” the Democrats are throwing out the playbook and trying a radical new approach - the “Novelty Candidate Tango.” This strategy dictates that the party hide its total lack of vision and platform behind a candidate who is an interesting “first” in the presidential campaign world, in this case choosing the “first” female and “first” African American candidates (who aren’t peripheral candidates).The former refuses to disown the Iraq War and resembles a Democrat only in husband, while the latter has no ideas or thoughts whatsoever. Forever paralyzed by their need to scoop up the plights of every demographic in the country, the Democrats once again reveal their only two talents - investigating and badmouthing those working up enough nerve to make actual decisions.

On the other hand, I have the Republicans, represented in the presidential race by “Who?” and attempting to ride on the coattails of a current President whose decisions have been so bad that every day I hear about how much everyone hates him, yet evidently “everyone” is not yet enough of a majority to stop anything he feels like doing. While the Democrats attempt to please every demographic that can be polled, the Republican Party seems content to focus on two core groups: rich people and evangelical Christians. (The fact that Democrats and Republicans are nearly splitting the vote down the middle in most elections is demographer’s nightmare.) While catering to rich people has its arguable merits, most people have to agree that evangelicals are completely nuts, so why are the Republicans so vehemently supportive of them? The Republican Party, which used to stand for smaller government, lower taxes, and staying out of people’s business, now stands for hating homosexuals, tapping phones, and torture. And despite all this, I still am paying the same in taxes.

One day, our children are going to sit in history class and be forced to write essays about this decade, and they’re either going to have to compare it to the Civil Rights era of the 1960’s, the Vietnam War Era of the 1970’s, or that one time we all got stupid, let democracy die, and Palpatine was crowned Emperor.

Oh, and my solution to my primary conundrum? Coin flip for the primary, Libertarian in the election. And that’s democracy in action.