It’s time again for yet another frivolous waste of everybody’s time. I am, of course, talking about the biennial political season. This year doesn’t involve a presidential election, which has an upside and a downside. The upside is that we aren’t being assaulted with wall-to-wall coverage of meaningless political drivel. The downside is that the people who involve themselves in off years become more annoying. They believe that the off years are the years where one can really make a difference. Since most of the politicos are supposedly sitting at home the people who show up can get politicians elected who will actually changed thing. Except the politicos aren’t sitting at home because politics is their one and only hobby. Political wannabe power players, the people who run local conventions and are well known in local political circles, never take a year off and they have enough influence locally to get their way every year.
But that doesn’t stop my more politically involved friends from calling, e-mailing, and messaging me on Facebook to beg me to show up to a local caucus, speech by their favored politician, or fundraiser. No matter how many times I explain to them that I’m not interested in politics they keep harassing me. They tell me that “This year is the most important year ever!” Yes, they tell me that every year. When I ask what’s in it for me (because I’m a self-interested bloke) they always try to feed me a line of bullshit that they think will convince me to stop doing whatever it is that I’m enjoying so I can go suffer through the mind numbing political process. As you can guess the most common reason given is that politician So-And-So is planning to take my guns so I must get out there and work for So-And-So’s opposition. Of course they usually leave the part out about So-And-So having a abject hatred of brown people in sandy regions, two men getting it on (they’re usually cool with two women getting it on but they would never tell you that), and people who want to keep secrets from the state. But I digress.
The point is I fucking hate this season. I hate the people running for office. I hate how people think they can make a meaningful difference through politics (trust me if you could it would be illegal). I hate how persistent my friends are no matter how clearly I state my hatred of politics. In fact I hate everything about the political season.
What I am about to write will almost certainly fall on deaf ears but I’m going to try anyways. I’m not going to help your pet politician. I don’t even like your pet politician. The fact that your pet politician is running for office already tells me everything I need to know about his or her moral character (which is to say he or she has no notable moral character). There are roughly 100 trillion other things I would rather do including watch paint dry, getting hit by a school bus that is on fire, or being locked in a five square foot cell with ravenous badgers (the number of badgers doesn’t matter).
I think you should run for office. You need to channel all that hate into something constructive. 😛
I can’t stand the political process when I’m just attending pointless party functions. Running for office would probably convince me to commit seppuku.