The Power of Speech

Obama vs Clinton

On the Election between Hillary and Obama

Maybe we are worrying about the wrong election. Maybe all the pundits are wrong. Maybe this is not the "change" election. Perhaps America's best days are not in front of, but behind us. And the change that we keep talking about that is always about to happen may never happen.

Why not? Because, of course, for the past four decades every election we've held was supposedly about "change". But the American people have voted for the candidates for the last twenty or thirty years that did not want to make the hard choices. We've voted for the status quo.

Through the decades, the American people have lost interest in the election process.  Some have become cynical and distrustful (dare I say -even...bitter?) regarding all candidates and politicians. It has been this way for the past 30 or 40 years. Just ask some of the historians covering American politics who've researched our entire 300 year history.  Maybe Watergate started it. Perhaps Clinton's impeachment exacerbated it. But for whatever reason it occurred, the electorate has heard the "change" mantra many times before.

Perhaps the change ought to have been made a long time ago. So what do we do now?  The American electorate is faced with some tough choices. Iraq is a quagmire or a messy black hole for whoever occupies the seat. The dollar has fallen to an all-time low. America's standing in the world is greatly diminished. Our deficit is soaring, we can't agree to guarantee health care or fix a broken entitlement system. We lag behind in investments in education and infrastructure. And Osama Bin Laden purportedly roams the hills and dales of the Afghanistan/Pakistan border.

So there it is. And all you need do is listen to C-Span and judge the partisan nature of our nation. And add the fact that this particular election is much more divisive than people imagine. If anyone thinks the passion that is out there for Clinton & Obama as candidates is something that is manufactured, witness the story of the brothers-in-law and the kitchen knife.  One supporter (Hillary's), stabs the other- his brother-in-law (an Obamamanian).

Where are we going with this? Nobody knows, but my belief is that we may have missed the boat already. The ship of state that was America's best & brightest days may have sailed off somewhere between Jimmy Carter and George Bush, but we may not find out what it all means for a couple of hundred years from now....