#12 The Numbers "Game"

You may be thinking that it’s too bad we can’t just nominate and elect the most-qualified people and forget about the strategy of getting 270 electoral votes. I agree wholeheartedly. It is too bad. But we can’t look at the history, especially the recent history, of presidential politics and say that we’ve always, or even often, elected the most qualified candidates. We haven’t.

However well or poorly we think our presidents have performed once in office, Eisenhower the candidate was not more qualified than Stevenson, Kennedy was not more qualified than Nixon (I can’t believe I’m saying something not-negative about Richard Nixon!), Reagan was NOT more qualified than Walter Mondale, Bill Clinton was probably not more qualified than HW, and dubya was most definitely not more qua…. Ohhh,…the Humanity.

Besides, in this current election, all three possible major party candidates are likely qualified to lead the country, though BO has less experience than HRC who has less experience than JMcC. And I disagree with JMcC’s proposals most of the three. We can debate what “qualified” means anyway. The point is that we need to change the direction of the country, and it’s not going to happen enough, or possibly at all, under another Republican administration. Hence, we play the political numbers game. Except that it’s not a game. It’s deadly serious. And it’s been particularly deadly for our armed forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, and for untold thousands of civilians there. John McCain said he is willing to keep our troops in Iraq “for a hundred years” if necessary.

No, this is no game.

And now, with tweve posts in a month, I think it’s time to let political matters settle down a bit. Let’s give the two major parties awhile, including today’s primaries in Ohio and Texas which pundits are saying may yield something resembling conclusive results. My thought is to give the Democrats and Republicans perhaps until later this month, before we continue to tell them how to conduct their campaigns. Oh. Wait. They’re not reading this blog.

Well, I’ll wait a couple of weeks anyway, say, until the week of March 17. At that time, I’ll have some thoughts on how one part of the economy in particular might play an even bigger role in the election than we currently expect. And then I’ll identify, at this early point at least, what I believe the likely swing states are going to be. In the meantime, feel free to add your own comments on the blog or by email. I look forward to them.

As they might say in Ahia and Texas, Y’all be well, now, y’hear.

triton