I would be happy for Obama to win in November & I would be overjoyed if the Democrats retained (and expanded) their grip of the Senate & ecstatic if they recaptured the House. Even so, that would a triumph of the Politics of the Lesser Evil.
So if Romney won't release his tax returns & loses the election because of that & similar reasons, that would be a Good Thing, but all that happiness, joy & ecstasy I cited is at base mere relief.
Because Republican policy positions ALONE, the contradictions, outright lies & red herrings therein SHOULD lead an informed electorate to turn out at rates exceeding 70% and deliver a defeat that renders the Republican Party, at least in its present form, as extinct as the brontosaurus.
I am irritated that candidates seem to win or lose on the basis of personal foibles (short of actual criminality)--or even on the basis of acts of virtue that have nothing to do with their qualification for office or the adequacy of their policy positions.
(I think of George Bernard Shaw, a professed socialist. Through his plays he became a very wealthy man. At one point he came in for quite a bit of criticism from his comrades because of his feud with the British tax authority about how much money he owed in taxes. George's reply was that until the UK became socialist, he would not pay one red cent in taxes beyond what he legally owed. Okay. There's obviously some naked self-interest there, but George had a point. I don't doubt that there are legal ways Romney could have gone 10 years without paying any taxes--he should either release the returns if that's the case or else refuse on a somewhat elaborated principle of some kind. Privacy could be a good enough reason, but he needs to say why a principle of privacy is not only important for him, but for society in general. Why would I give good advice to the enemy? Well, my advice might work for someone, but I'm pretty sure it would backfire somehow in Romney's hands. Also, the chance of a politician learning of my good advice is approximately the same as that of the proverbial snowball in the Bad Place)
One good target for blame is the so-called "independent voter." Studies have shown that these are primarily people who are not particularly interested in politics--or who really dislike politics, but regard voting as an onerous duty, and who usually wind up voting for the same party each time--in other words, not really independent in the sense of being truly above party preferences. They are also inclined to be "low information" voters, and even when they are interested in an issue, what they know about the issue is often wrong. I remember one blogger-activist from 2004 describing his effort to convince a caller to vote for Kerry. The caller was just such an "independent" and was convinced beyond reason that George Bush was a strong environmentalist. I can only surmise the caller had heard in passing the Orwellian descriptions the Bush Administration conferred on its anti-environmentalist positions (Clear Skies, Healthy Forests, etc.) and those descriptions had become fixed in the caller's mind--or it could be the caller simply heard pundits babbling in the background about the environment & George Bush and got the association stuck in her mind.
I'm sure there are sociological & other reasons the independent voter could or should be forgiven, but here's what scares me: ever since Reagan was elected--& maybe going back to the Goldwater campaign--the Right Wing has single-mindedly pursued, by any means of persuasion available, the destruction of the social safety net--in fact, any government function or agency that purports to serve the common good & replace them all private institutions whose primary purpose is to protect and promote the power and welfare of the super-rich.
In fictional narratives, a strong villain is relentless. In this real world narrative, the strong villain is equally relentless.
I believe Obama is going to win this one & stave off The Worst--although I wouldn't bet the mortgage money.
But some day, some combination of political circumstances, voter misinformation & apathy, bad weather--whatever--is going to allow the election of a President & some like-minded turkeys in Congress who *believe* in The Worst & people will wake up a few years later without social security, medicare & possibly without the right to vote or the right to join a union, no access to a decent education & the list could go on and on...
To use a phrase I saw on FB, it's the "long con" of the Republican Party.
R.
http://gg9-tto.blogspot.com/
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