7th Inning Stretch

We should be able to sue politicians for false advertising. It might greatly pare down the banal rhetoric we endure as voters. Someone look into that. Who's to say we can't?

Speaking of politicians, campaign season is moving along at full steam. I don't think I could swing a cat without hitting a candidate or some college student shouting slogans. I found my peace of mind thoroughly molested last week while attending an Iowa Cubs game. I went to enjoy a game of minor league baseball; but a row of College Coffee-Shop Liberals for Obama sat in the row behind me, occasionally breaking into pro-Obama chants for all the crowd to hear - essentially pissing all over my sanctuary. Please people, don't bring your fucking politics to my baseball games. I thoroughly support your freedom of speech, but timing, in ALL things, is the key to success. Don't come on so heavy. I go to a ballgame to avoid your stump speeches and sloganeering.

Some will tell me that I should relax, that it is a good thing that young people are getting involved. And I agree with the latter. It does make me happy to see the kids out there doing their part, utilizing the rights granted them by the Constitution. But the obnoxious shouting I hear at a ballgame should be centered around the game, not politics.

But they were young. And they still think that the two parties are dramatically different. They believe all the rhetoric. Most of them will believe it all of their lives, goose-stepping along with the party line.

Outside of the wedge issues of abortion and gay marriage I wonder how great a distance really seperates the leadership in our two parties? Do you suppose the decision-makers up top really want to win on those issues?

Let's just say that the Republicans finally outlaw even the thought of abortion (suppose they'd give the death penalty?) and finally get that amendment banning gay marriage. What will they do when the former mill worker in Alabama realizes that those measures did not bring his job back? And that he still does not have health care and cannot afford to send his daughter to college?

And just imagine that Democrats completely restore a woman's right to choose an abortion and ensure that gays have the right to marry. What will be left then to distract the public from their marraige to the same corporate bosses as the GOP? Will they finally be forced to truly FIGHT for universal health care? Will they really pass public financing of elections over of the objections of those big money contributors? Or will they continue to dole it all out one teaspoon at a time, forever seeking to find the middle ground?

But We The People acquiesce and go on playing their games, drowning out any real discourse with our sloganeering and mud-slinging. I think it's time we all shut our mouths for a while and pay attention to what's happening on the field.