I thought I might take a moment to comment on the debates, I
know I am behind every other political blogger out there in cyber space, but I
wanted to take some time and really consider what we have learned from the two
debates, before we move on to the third, and submit what I hope is a nonpartisan
opinion.
The bottom line for me is that I don’t think any of us
really learned anything new. Every point and counter point that I have heard
from both sides really only re iterated the same talking points that they have
been blathering on about for months. Setting aside Mr. Romney’s performance
during the first debate and VP Biden goofiness in the 2nd, did you
really learn anything new? Anything that might persuade you to think
differently than you already did? I would suspect not.
Worse yet is that there really hasn’t been a debate. A
debate usually consists of two or more people engaged in an exchange of ideas,
the purpose of which is to persuade others to their way of thinking, this
clearly has not been done. Instead we have had nothing but accusations and
ridicule that have reminded me of little more than a school yard brawl, in
particular during the VP debate, VP Biden interrupted over eighty times and the
so called moderator, in a few cases, seemingly anyhow, joined in with Biden to basically
shut down anything that Ryan was saying. That’s not a debate, that’s just
saying what you wish and shouting down the other guy before he can present his
view. I’m not trying to defend Ryan, he’s a big boy, but I am saying that for
many people, who have never heard what Ryan stands for, never got the chance
and so the American people lose out.
The second part of it though, going back to trying to persuade
others to your point of view, is that I have yet to really hear what either
side plans on doing in the next 4 years, this is really what I had hoped to
hear in the debates. Here we have a messed up economy, a debt of over 16
trillion, 23 million out of work or have given up trying, more people on food
stamps than ever, gas prices through the roof, possibly a major war brewing in
the middle east, which would make oil prices go even higher, freedoms being
stripped away bit by bit, on and on this list could go, but it doesn’t matter
because neither one of the candidates really want to go into specifics as to what
they will do about anything . So instead of getting down to the nitty gritty of
what they plan on doing, we get little more than theatrics and accusations.
So, as such, all most people are getting before this
election is little more than sound bites and lots of misinformation presented
by both sides. I scroll through my Face Book feed and see those same sound
bites repeated over and over again to the point of where I have quit reading
them. I read today that those that actually check the facts for a living are
suggesting that because we have become such a sound bite society and a people
who expect to be lied to, that we don’t pay attention to the facts when they
are presented to us, rather we just go with whatever party we have always gone
with and facts be damned. This I would say is a large part of the problem. We
hear nothing but accusations from the candidates because they already assume
that we don’t care about the truth we just want a good show. They certainly pay
attention to the polls and the stats and they know that they can say whatever
they want and their base is going to go with the flow without ever checking the
facts.
So I will watch the next debates, not with any hope of
hearing anything substantive or truthful, and with the full knowledge that what
follows will be a barrage of sound bites and misrepresentations. Sad but it
seems to be the new American way.
