Candidates, College Students, Pots, and Me
After the 2002 elections, there was another push to move the primaries earlier. This time, however, the motivation seemed to be to get national candidates to pay more attention to Minnesota. Again, the attempt failed. However, Minnesota may get more attention anyway because we are now a "swing" state instead of a "liberal" state. (A swing state is, I think, a state where the citizenry would love to take a swing at any candidate rather than just candidates from only one of the parties.)
I've always found this bizarre. Why on earth would anyone want to start the election campaigns any earlier? After an election, does a significant percentage of people say "golly, I miss campaign ads on television"? Okay, the guys selling the ads probably say that. If politicians truly want America to vote, they would shorten the election season by a year or more so people aren't fed up with the entire process. I wonder how many people actively don't vote as a simple protest against candidates' pandering, mudslinging, and self-embellishment.
Well, I must be one of them in the insignificant percentage because I did something strange. 20 months before the election, I signed up for e-mail updates from all of the candidates from the Democratic and Republican parties. Not only that, but I've also signed up for e-mail updates from the parties themselves.
Now, with only 15 months until the election, my e-mail account dedicated to those updates over 30% full. I might have to start weeding out messages.
Many of them would be easy to weed out. They say the same thing: send money now. Now I know how the parents of college students feel. Whenever I hear from the candidates, they ask for money. "Dear Mark, I just voted to end off shore tax havens. P.S. Send money." I just hope that the presidential candidates are spending the money on more than just beer and mac & cheese. Not that I sent any money. (And I refuse to attend any rallies for fear of them asking to borrow the car.) I just want straightforward information so I know which one is most deserving of my vote.
Straightforward information is looking like it is too much for any of them to handle as judged by another of their unfortunate e-mail patterns: the fake news report. I'm already tired of seeing how "Thousands of enthusiasts cheered loudly/loudest for Candidate Sam during his speech to the Group of Your Choosing." Okay, that was actually a paraphrase. There is no candidate named Sam and Group of Your Choosing isn't an actual group (but could be one of Dave Barry's rock bands). But, the point is, treating me like I'm someone who's too dumb to figure out a really news article from one the folks at The Onion would deem "too goofy to print" isn't going to garner my vote. I want information, not propaganda. Although, to be honest, I did enjoy when Bush thanked me for being a leader. Okay, Bush didn't. It was actually signed by Bush-Cheney '04 Inc. But I still appreciate the message even if it came from an insincere form letter.
To sum up; sending me an e-mail message with a bogus article is bad. Sending me an e-mail message with a bogus compliment is good. Quiz tomorrow.
Bob Graham, however, is innovative. He sponsored a race truck. Not very informative, but still kinda cool. He clearly has the Folks-who-watch-people-drive-in-circles-for-three-hours vote going for him. That's a demographic you can't do without. All kidding aside, that is a pretty good demographic to have. Especially compared to the 17 people who read this. I'm not really sure how he's going to court the environment groups when he's sponsoring a race truck. But it was still clever. Kudos to Bob Graham.
I've been getting these updates from the candidates for a couple months now. Finally, a couple of weeks ago, I decided to add updates from the Republican Party's web site. Do yourself a favor; stay far away from the Democrat and Republican national committee web sites. They seem to be based in one of the worst aspects of politics: character assassination. (If you think me complaining about political character assassination is the pot calling the kettle black, read on.) Both sites have more than their fair share of heckling the opposition. In fact, it's not even until you reach the bottom of the DNC.org web site that it is revealed that the Democrats actually have candidates.
The RNC.org web site is actually funny. As an amateur political semi-partisan (I'm not for any particular party, I'm just against one), I'm used to reading, hearing, speaking, and writing partisan slams. But what the RNC did transcended partisan and went straight to silly. The home page had a link titled "Graham gets confused -- again." I clicked on the link. It takes you to a statement released by "Senior RNC advisor" Ed Gillespie. Grand Old Ed caught Bob Graham referring to "deceit" as a "five-letter word." Clearly, deceit is a seven-letter word. Just kidding...it's only four. If you're in a sporting venue--like the NASCAR Truck circuit like Graham seems to enjoy--deceit is probably a two-character word. One character that holds up a big cardboard cutout of the letter D and the character seated next to the first character holds up a cardboard cutout of a chair or a fanny.
So Graham miscounted by one letter. And the Republicans jumped on it. If I may quote birthday-quiz guru Edd Dykhuizen,
Dear Kettle,
You're black.
Sincerely,
The Pot
I don't know about the rest of you, but I've got a calendar on my desk called "'They Misunderestimated Me!' The Very Curious Language of George W. Bush." It's a calendar that gives you a unique Bush quote every day. Here are some of my favorite misspeaks:
Regarding the last one, Bush was off by two. Graham was only off by one. Does that make Bush twice as "confused" as Graham? As my brother, Jon, noted once, I counted seven characters in the name "The Who." If 1 + 1 = 2, does that mean that it takes the sum of Bob Graham's confusion plus my confusion to be as confused as Bush? How many Democrats does it take to change Bush's light bulb?
So perhaps you're thinking, "Gosh, Mark, you're nitpicking Bush. Bush and the RNC are two entirely different entities." Okay, that might be true, but I doubt it. But let's pretend they are two different entities.
If you will recall, the reason I went to the RNC web site was to sign up for the e-mail newsletter. I recalled that, too. So I went to the newsletter sign-up page. Unfortunately, it's one of those that ask for more than just your e-mail address. It asks for a mailing address also. So I completed the form. Or, at least, I attempted to complete the form. There was a slight problem. When I double-checked my information, I noticed the zip code was amiss. I THOUGHT I had entered it correctly, but it was missing a number.
Wait a minute. I had typed it correctly. Except that the RNC--the folks who made fun of Bob Graham not being able to count to six correctly--only gave FOUR spaces for the zip code. A typical zip code traditionally has 5 digits. (Although now there are technically 9 digits, even though most people ignore the last four.) In the end, it didn't much matter, as the confirmation page to which the RNC tried to send me didn't actually exist. Oh well, I guess I won't be getting updates from the RNC. I may never truly know the extent of Bob Graham's confusion
So it looks like little valuable information comes from receiving e-mail updates from candidates. I suggest you learn from my mistake (signing up for e-mail updates, not the assorted other mistakes I've made of which I'm sure Jon will forward me an itemized list), and don't give your e-mail address to politicians. And ALWAYS stay away from party web sites; they just scary. Just check the candidates' web site (their creepy enough, anyway). Pick a day shortly before the election--which gives you time to read their issues stances and gives them time to perfect their lies.
It seems like Halloween would be an appropriate day for that.
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The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer and do not neccessarily reflect those of the rest of the family.
© 2003, Mark Wentz