Is there a reset in this political game?
(Part 4 of 4)
Summary:
We re-emphasize the point we made in Part 1 of this series:
America should have a government of, by, and for the people.
We are failing badly at that right now.
It’s easy to look at what we think is wrong with America. We tend to focus on that. And those things need fixing. But there is still much right with America.
However …
America has been at the mountain top for some time, but we’re now headed down from that peak with a bunch of hairpin turns on the way. And our brakes are failing us.
The large numbers of Bernie supporters and Trump supporters are trying to tell us something – from opposite sides. America has big problems today that we need to deal with.
All groups or entities in the nation must work together to produce an economically and socially viable system.
We aren’t.
There are such strong feelings on both sides. Will Americans come together after this highly contentious campaign and election?
We fear they may not.
Many people are turned off by this election. Others seem energized.
According to the published polls, neither major Presidential candidate is well liked. Both have substantial problems. I’m not sure even the statement about the lesser of great two evils is appropriate.
Who wins may depend on whether the Hillary haters or the Trump haters turn out in larger numbers. That’s not the way we should feel about an election.
Both candidates twist the other’s statements to misrepresent and mislead – something typical in politics.
Getting at the truth (fact checking) in this race, as well as in many others, is very difficult. Once something volatile gets on the internet, whether true or not, it spreads. People who are inclined to believe it do that, and spread it further. Even Snopes has been accused of bias in altering the “truth”.
None of these candidates is suitable
Presidential material for what we need now.
If neither major party candidate is deemed acceptable, what do we do?
We have a few options as things stand now.
1 – we can vote for the lesser of the two “great evils” – however you define that
2 – we can not vote at all
3 – we can vote for other positions on the ballot, just not President
4 – we can write in “None of the above” for President
5 – we can vote for one of the minority party Presidential candidates
Neither of the two significant minority parties – Libertarian and Green – has a reasonable chance due to the embedded constituencies of the two majors.
Right now, we don’t have a “none of the above” line or box. Any write-ins for that won’t be counted.
We should have a line or box for voting “none of the above”. But what would we do if “none of the above” got a higher vote count than any of the candidates?
So where’s the reset button in this political game?
Unfortunately, there isn’t one.
back to where you were
But if there was a reset button, what point in time would we reset to?
Would we go back only to the point where we run another set of primary campaigns? Then follow through with a full election with different candidates?
Or would we go back much further?
Unfortunately, in real life as we understand it, time only moves forward. So we have to wait until 2020 for a Presidential rework. Do we have that much time? We might be able to start in 2018 with Congress.
Even if we had a President who would support what must be done, one person from the outside is not going to shake up Washington to the degree it needs. There are too many entrenched politicians in Congress and moneyed lobbyists to support them.
The situation with lobbyists, etc. is actually corruption, not just underhanded deal-making.
However this one turns out …
Can we bring the Bernie and Trump supporters together to fix things?