By David Walley

OFF TO THE RACES

The pundits have commenced handicapping the race, laying down the odds, the primary season will be upon us shortly. How time flies; wasn't it just last year we had elections? Up here in Maine where I'm presently situated, close on to New Hampshire, the candidates are thick upon the ground along with the national media out in the trenches to second guess the voters. You can't avoid them now, just wait until the fall when all will be quiet again and it will be back to business as usual. This is not political affairs, this is the circus that comes to town once every four years.

And since it's primary season up here in the Great North, I'm thinking what do Americans really want out of a presidential candidate? Is it a father, a next door neighbor, an average joe, a superior joe, a lout, smarter than the average bear or the average bear? Is (s)he supposed to be competent in foreign policy, domestic policy, a single taxer, pro-life, anti-choicer, free trader, tariff man, pro or anti the United Nations? Is the candidate supposed to be better than the rest of us or worse? Have a past or not? And what does "having a past" mean in this increasingly tabloid age? But let's cut to the chase here, shall we? Cut through the sound bites we've all heard again and again which streams out hour after hour from talk TV at the upper end of the cable box and admit how bored we already are of the process. The American electorate, if the truth be known, has a right to be bored, at least that percentage that bothers to tune into the whole spectacle. Or maybe it's not boredom as much as they are wary and have been for a while now because they've finally figured out that it really doesn't matter much who's in charge (who's on first?). Things run pretty much as they always have. And if the truth be known, so long as there's prosperity (or what passes for same) it doesn't matter who's in the White House. Just like Warren Beatty -- who isn't running for president -- said at the Kennedy School in Boston a month or so ago, "There aren't two parties, there's only one."

And we know he's right, and about the only thing that separates the two parties is the amount of soft money raised, the fallacy being that the more money raised, the more people will vote. Sadly, the truth is that participation in the electoral process on the national level has been steadily decreasing to the point where maybe 25% of the registered voters elect a president every four years, and it's a percentage which will surely decline this time around. Pundits are forever harping about how dismal this percentage is compared with other countries who also have an electoral process, they twit and tut-tut their audience, for shame, for shame.

Should be ashamed? Maybe we're just spoiled, more to the point tired of scandal (real and put up), the bullshit: town meetings, talking heads, spin doctors who write political columns, paid shill editorial boards and polls? Maybe it's as things should be, for I'd venture that if something were really rotten in this state, voters would pour out of the hills to complain and the news wires would crackle with contention. The truth is harder to take, I'm thinking, the truth being that politicians count on the fact that no one gives a good Goddamn, especially those who represent the Republicrat point of view. As for the largest group of voters, the Independents, they're embroiled in their own soap opera with Pat Buchanan and Donny Trump fighting it out. Can you imagine what a threat they'd be to the Republicrats if they had their act together and were on the ballot in all fifty states? But not to worry, this threat to the demos is covered by the two "major" parties so we have stalemate and stasis, boredom mixed with belly-aching, elephants and donkeys oh my! But then again, it's going to be a while until the "major" political parties have to reflect the changing demographic nature of the American demos - the Latino vote for one. Which leads into another soup of contention, that perhaps America itself is an outmoded concept int the age of multi-nationality, capitalism, big media of the increasingly wired-in world.

Ok, so let's embrace the new technology, let's stuff ourselves with internet goodies, websites, interlocking freezone information supply dumps. We've got websites galore in the political realm and you can pony on up your electronic conscience, but how meaningful is that when the surfers themselves have no sense of discernment, when making an informed choice is more a crapshoot depending on flashy graphics, bells and whistles? Do we want our politicians to be more responsible to these electronic polls or less? I mean it's almost like writing an e-mail to the White House as in "who really reads them?" We seems to have this idea that we can apply "web-ocracy" to anything and it will work something like e-commerce, on which the jury is still out, or at least until after this first of many holiday seasons.

The current mystery trend among the netteratti is towards flacking for electronic participatory democracy where (they fervently hope) everyone will have their own vote, where there will be no polling booths, where neither rain, nor sleet, nor dark of night will influence the numbers, where information will be free for all (in a freeforall), and sorrow sing sorrow, good will win out in the end. Of course that presupposes that the masses will all have access to a pc, a big 'if' all by itself, and that there also will be a high degree of electronic literacy to go with this, another big if. But who am I to go against the mystery trend, right?

But 'tis the season to be jelly, I suppose, as I'm writing this looking dead on to the year 2000 and the upcoming millennial elections. There's supposed to be a presidential election, there are supposed to be candidates who are supposed to be the "people's" choice, but will it be the electronic people, or the people who raise the most money? If money still talks, who's really listening to what's being said. And how will we know whether it matters? As my old history teacher used to say, "Keep your powder dry and a low silhouette." Best wishes for the new years ahead, y'all.


(C) 2000 - David G. Walley