Although the frenetic pace of the Internet renders all news over 24 hours old stale and ancient, I thought I would comment on the recent midterm elections.
As everyone with half a brain knows by now, the Democratic Party has recently gained control of Congress.
I tend to be apolitical on this blog, choosing instead to focus on the larger scheme of things than subjects as trivial as party politics. Instead, I thought I'd focus on the process itself, and some of the environmental factors relevant to that process.
Democracy is largely a good thing. People vote how they want, and the person with the most votes wins. It's certainly not a perfect system, but it's the best one we've got. Throw in the concept of checks and balances, and you've got a political system that's been fairly stable for the last two centuries.
Time has shown that political parties in the American system wax and wane with amazing regularity. The majority of them, when viewed through a historical lens, have failed. Thus, Americans have not only elected politicians from political parties; they have also determined the viability of the parties themselves.
I imagine the typical voter chooses the individual who most agrees with his or her viewpoints, i.e. notions on how society should be run. These viewpoints are necessarily grand notions, ranging the gamut of everything pertinent and germane to the organization of a free people. The list is practically endless- taxation, social security, public services, etc.
The inherent weakness in a two-party political process is that the average person makes their selection not by determining who is
most like them, but instead by settling on the individual who is the
least not like them. This is a sad, yet practical reality of our existence as a voter. All too often, the choice is one of weighing differences, instead of comparing commonalities.
This event arises due to the fact that the attempt to place the range of human philosophies into two distinct camps is patently absurd in its application; we are too varied to be so easily categorized, boxed and shelved. Yet we sacrifice our nobilities and personal preferences in the name of efficiency, predictability, and tradition.
Even more disheartening is the fact that recent elections illuminate the fact that the country is evenly split along party lines. Of course, consensus is not necessarily a sign of strength, nor truth. But the recent clear split in American politics illuminates a situation where either the American populace has reached a philosophical fork in the road, or one where the citizenry has settled in the middle, and are forced to choose a boat to either shore.
Imagine an individual who falls in the exact middle on every single political issue. Who is he to vote for? How should he vote? If he does not vote, his opinion is wasted. If he does vote, he skews his opinion. Is one better than the other? Of course, such a man hardly exists, but there are millions who fall so close to that line that any attempt to hazard a guess as to which side they fall would be a mere guess. The average American, it is safe to say, has little in common with either George Bush or Nancy Pelosi. Yet they are both in the highest echelons of governmental power; only a two-party system could produce such a result.
Our democracy is representative; its viability hinges on the existence of candidates who viably represent the electorate's views. Otherwise, we have government buildings full of straw men in suits.
There are safeguards, of course, but the parties in power have weakened their applicability. If there's anything Republicans and Democrats hate equally, it's a viable third-party candidate in a national election. Like a close-knit family, they spar and bicker with one another, but will rally to defeat outsiders. For an outsider threatens to destroy the very ring they compete in- the ring they've created. The news channels purport to carry out this fiction, focusing so much on the Republican v. Democratic contests that we lose sight of the fact that it's possible to have other competitors. We've been inculcated to instantly distrust "independent" candidates, even though our very republic was founded on the idea that we could support ourselves.
It appears as if the process has devolved into a tipsy coachmen- one that bumbles toward its eventual goal, as opposed to sprinting toward it. Republicans push one way, Democrats push another, and we end up somewhere in the middle. The process occurs again and again. We move thousands of miles, yet only travel an inch.
Regardless of your personal opinions regarding the midterms, I think the more fundamental (and far more interesting) question focuses on the actual democratic process as it exists today, and whether or not such a system can continue to work. I don't know the answer to that question, but that doesn't stop me from raising it.
