The Vote!

Why is it that when it comes to politics we value ignorance? Okay, by the time anyone reads this blog, the 2010 elections will be done, so my question may seem irrelevant; bad timing. Still, let us consider the rhetoric.

“Elect me!” Why? “Because I am an average Joe Citizen; I am not a ‘professional.’ I have little or next to no political experience, I’m neither politically astute nor am I highly educated; I’m just a regular Joe Blow [or Jane Doe, as the case may be] with deep conviction and energetic passion.” Really? So, I have to ask, what’s wrong with an astute, highly educated and intelligent well informed candidate that has years of experience under his/her belt? “They’ve lost touch with the common people!” Oh, I see. Hmm, is it not possible that it’s really the other way around? Perhaps the common people have lost touch with the machinery and intricacies of government.

Are we really better off electing simple but passionate, inexperienced but starry eyed, uninformed but willful candidates to high office? Is that really what we want? We shall elect a person to Congress or to the United States Senate just because they talk like plain ole country folk, are agreeable, likeable, are laid back and easy-going and have no experience in government and no personal knowledge of the workings of our constitutional laws? And then, when in office, we expect them to make smart, intelligent, well-informed decisions and to wisely participate in the legislative process to make things move, as if they are experts at it? What’s wrong with this picture?

Why is ignorance and non-experience better than knowledge, education, and tried and true practiced experience in our ideal of a good candidate? Is running the government of the Unites States of American mere child’s play, such that we should assume that any Joe Blow or Jane Doe citizen can be put in office to do it?

Is it possible, just possible, that it is not the highly educated, well trained, and deeply complex thinker that is taking our nation down the wrong path? Rather, might it be that it is the naïve, the simple-minded, the un-informed, the provincial (those who are narrow and limited in outlook), or just the plain ole ignorant (lacking substantial knowledge in content) that may be doing this nation the most harm?

This is a valid question. It seems to me that we are distrustful of intelligent, highly educated, and well-informed politicians. Politicians who speak insightfully and wisely about complex issues seem to be distrusted, as if the fact that they are smart, well-informed, and are able to see more than one side to an issue automatically makes them shifty and unreliable and therefore untrustworthy in office. Why is that? A politician is caught admitting that certain national issues and concerns are complex and that there is no one easy solution to resolve them, suddenly they’re seen as slick and sly, underserving of our full confidence. How foolish we are. The problem is, we want immediate gratification, no matter what the long term consequence or outcome may be to the nation’s welfare as a whole—that is, we don’t care to think too deeply about the issues and we certainly don’t want our representatives to think too deeply about them either, we just want things to go our way and that’s that. This kind of attitude is a recipe for making very bad and very poor political decisions for long term solutions.

And so politicians are giving us what we want. We are drawn to the simple home spun politician who comes out with short, pithy, three word little slogans: I’m for you! I’ll fix it. I’ll fight it. I’ll change it. I’ll reduce it. I’ll correct it. I’ll put things right! We hear this ad nauseam. The thing is, they never say just exactly how they will fix, change, fight, or correct the problem, other than shout all the more loudly to say that they are against the opponent’s solution, whatever it is, good bad or indifferent, and are for us the voter.

In short, neither politicians nor voters want to really understand the complexities of an issue; nor do we have the patience to allow time for working out practical solutions. We simply choose sides and tear apart the opposing side. We don’t care to ask intelligent questions. We hear what we want to hear; my side and my side only! And, if a real intelligent answer is actually given in response to an intelligent question, we’ve already tuned out, short attention span that we have. Or, worse, we’ve shut out the answer because of a narrow-minded unwillingness to hear something that might correct our own half-baked thinking on the subject. We’re like the child that cups hands over ears and shouts, “I’m not listening! I’m not listening! Nah, nah, nah, nah, naaah!” Yes, as a nation we are becoming childish in our political antics.

Political campaigns that incite the passions—fear, anger, hatred, and contempt for the other side (“the enemy”), is politics based on ignorance; ignorance in that there is no desire to inform and to enlighten. Having no interest in bringing knowledge and understanding to an issue, politicians and special interest groups hide behind a wall of misinformation, innuendo, re-direction, and secrecy (if not outright lies). Why, because the real truth—actual facts, figures, and informed content—may hurt their election! And be bad for particular interests groups.

So, if we don’t want highly educated, knowledgeable, intelligent, and experienced, wise, insightful, and well-informed individuals working in the great halls of our legislative branches of government, so be it. If we don’t want to know the truth about the issues at hand (whether we like what we hear or not), and if we don’t care to understand their complexities, and if we’d rather pretend that every problem has easy simple solutions, and if we want to think and act as if the opposite side of the political spectrum is totally to blame for all of our nation’s ills while our own political side is as innocent as a choir of angels, let us enjoy our blissful ignorance.

But let us remember, as things go wrong and our nation continues to struggle with bitter divisiveness, it is we, the voters, who chose to remain in the dark—naïve, ignorant, and uninformed—by not demanding better of our politicians. It is we who are allowing our politicians to dupe us with quick easy and inane slogans rather than demanding of them some real content with actual factual and intelligent answers. Not even the media seem to be asking the crucial and important questions regarding the complex national and international challenges that our nation faces. All we get are jokes, bashing, demonizing, and castigating accusatory innuendos like, “he can take… and shove it!” And it seems that that is all we want of our politicians. How ignorant is that?!