Monday, January 23, 2012

Debate? What Debate?


Is it just me or have the debates really gone on too long? I mean, really! How many have there been now? Fifty? A Hundred? There are sitcoms that don’t run as long as these debates have been going on!

And it is not as if there is anything particularly newsworthy in them. They are essentially free infomercials for the Republican Party that the networks are running for free. If I were a political candidate I’d look into whether I have any way to get free advertising time under the FCC’s equal-time rules.

And they are all the same:

Romney-to-Gingrich: “You cheated on your wife.”

Gingrich-to-Romney: “You’re rich.”

Romney-to-Gingrich: “You were a lobbyist.”

Gingrich-to-Romney: “You ran a hedge fund.”

Santorum-To-Romney and Gingrich: “I’m more of a conservative than both of you combined!”

Paul-to-Anyone who will listen: “We need to abolish the income tax, pull the military home, and set-up an egalitarian utopia.”

All of the candidates in unison: “The Democrats are destroying the country, Obama is evil!”

Really, I know of less formulaic disco tunes!

The problem is, as I see it, that we are not learning anything new about this crowd of people. You want to know what this field is all about? Here you go:
  • Mitt Romney is rich and will claim to believe anything to get elected.
  • Newt Gingrich is smarmy and will say anything he needs to to get elected.
  • Rick Santorum is a religious zealot who will say anything that doesn't directly clash with his religion if he thinks he can score points with it.
  • Ron Paul is possibly the most sincere of the group, unfortunately he has some fringe beliefs that make him unacceptable to the rest of his party. Which is unfortunate; I actually believe some of his less drastic ideas are not bad ones.
Being impartial and of no party, I am not about to say that the democrats don’t do essentially the same thing when they are not in power, but the difference is that before this year there might have been two or three debates during the preliminaries. This year, the debates seem to drag out more than the “last few minutes” of a football game!

Come on, broadcasters! Pull the plug already! Do we really need another thousand debates!?

Wherever you are today I hope that you will get involved in putting an end to the debates. – Vote!

Don Bergquist – January 23, 2012 – Lakewood, Colorado, USA

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