I'm Really Glad It's Over

I’m so glad the election is over.

I’m not going to bemoan who lost or celebrate who won. Those of you, who know me, know who I supported, and I’m not eager to start jawing over politics.

Instead, let me discuss how much I hate discussing politics. This may infuriate a lot of people, but I can’t stand listening to anyone, no matter what their affiliation, rant about this candidate or that candidate, or scream at one another about this issue or that. To me, it’s a waste of breath.

I’ve always voted, but this year because of an address-related snafu I opted not to bother. I’ve always believed my vote didn’t count and I can’t stand the Electoral College either, but that’s a whole other discussion.

I have friends who will discuss politics until the cows come home and who love to argue, and I have some who are completely ignorant of the political process, and content to be so. I fall somewhere in the middle. I like to stay informed, but I’ll read the three New York tabloids, and CNN online, and that’s about the extent of it. No Sunday talk shows for me, no political blogs, no party rags.

I will say that I think the effusive joy at Obama’s election is a bit much. Does anyone really believe a golden age is dawning? Not to take anything away from the man’s accomplishments, which are historic, but he’s not the Messiah, and the jubilation with which he’s being received is nothing short of ridiculous to me. Perhaps history will prove me wrong.

I believe that most people enter politics to make a difference, and a great majority of them end up corrupted by the process. And if they aren’t, their idealism ends up severely compromised by the machine that needs greasing and the favors that must be granted in order to get things done.

I can’t invest myself in a process where the loudest voices that are heard are the extreme ones. I have major issues with both parties. A good friend recently outlined his beliefs in a way that somewhat mirrors my own, and it was a “little from Column A and a little from Column B.”

Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful to live in this country, and I applaud those who enter public service, but there are so few Presidents throughout the course of history who have won my admiration.

I have to admit, my paramount concern is my own bottom line, and that of my family. Put simply, life is tough these days, and I want it to improve. Neither candidate inspired confidence in me that he was going to do that. If I had voted, I would have voted my party line.

Holding a cynical world view has always served me well. It minimizes disappointment. It makes me inherently suspicious, and has kept people who don’t have my best interests at heart out of my life.

My disgust with politics should not be equated with a belief that I don’t care. I do care, and I offer no solutions to improve the process. I am disgusted by favoritism, bureaucracy, lobbying, spin, earmarking, pork, equivocation, etc., and I’d be stunned if, in my lifetime, we shook off the bonds of all this crap to govern the way our fathers intended.