Monday, October 18, 2010

Country On the Brink

Here we are, only 2 weeks out from another mid term election, and no one really knows how it will turn out. The CW from polling points to a republican landslide. But how can that be? Only two years ago the country resoundingly showed the door to the GOP, that left the country bankrupt, mired in two unpopular wars, one conducted for no rational reason, and now voters say they plan to hand back congress to the wingnuts. It is a disconnect that has pretty much sent me into the don't give a shit mode, that I truly hope will make me look silly on election day, when democrats retain the majorities in congress. I don't pretend to know what is going on in this country right now, as we have witnessed one of the most productive legislative sessions in the nations history, passing universal health care reform, we are down to 50 thousand troops in Iraq, and headed for the door there. There is the unpopular now war in Afghanistan, and a temporary escalation, but with an expiration date of next summer where we will begin to leave there.

I know the old adage "It's the economy stupid", and that has certainly been a mixed bag for Obama and dems. Staving off a depression collapse we were teetering on just two years ago. Though we are not experiencing a quick bounce back from that severe downturn, we are also not standing in soup lines. I don't know what to think of the American voter, and it's attention span of a grasshopper, and seemingly bottomless pit of willingness to believe the most vapid lies of the Republicans, who have nearly completely abandoned any effort to participate in governing the past 2 years. And have not proposed any new ideas past the ones that led to the current mess we are in. Offering nothing much but conspiracy theories about our first black president, often crossing the line into rank racism.

It is a sad state of affairs for sure, and the activist left seems to be the right wings best ally, validating some of the worst bad faith critiques from the right, and even offering some of their own. Our politics right now just makes me ill, and blogging about them a painful chore that is more like howling at the moon for some sanity and perspective. I have resigned myself to voting and other than that just watching what happens in this apparent crumbling democracy. Seems too late to save to me. Hope I am wrong about that.