Bush Will Win in 2004 and There's Nothing We Can do About It

bobd

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Fri Jan-02-04 04:30 PM
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Bush Will Win in 2004 and There's Nothing We Can do About It

My premise is based on some assumptions that are most certainly up for discussion. The keystone assumption is this: Presidential elections are a referendum on the incumbent’s job performance over the previous term. Put another way – the 2004 election is about how well Bush has done over the last 4 years. The electorate (what’s left of them) votes accordingly. That’s why Gore won in 2000. Clinton did a very good job at governing. Given this premise of Bush’s job performance, things look pretty good for us, right? Sadly, however, times have changed and with it the meaning of “job performance”.

How does the electorate judge whether or not the incumbent has “done well”?

The economy
People look at their lives and ask: “Am I employed? Do I feel that I’m paid sufficiently to make ends meet? Can I make ends meet?” If yes, the guys in power are a leg up. If not they’ll look at what other, perhaps more knowledgeable, people are saying about it all. In this case I firmly believe that much of what passes for “the economy” is what‘s perceived to be the health of the economy. At this point the news media is frothing about how the economy is rebounding, about how the stock market is once again manically creating “wealth”. People will hear this and, even though they themselves might not be doing so well, jump on the bandwagon and withhold judgment. They’ll say, “If I just wait a bit longer things will probably pick up for me again. After all, everyone is saying things are getting better. Voting in a new guy might really queer things. I think I’ll stay with the status quo.” Baring a major, unambiguous economic meltdown this issue is Bush’s. Again – it’s a perception thing at this point for a lot of people and the media is not gonna dis Bush on this. They should but they won’t. The won’t because they’re part of our society and are pushed and pulled by the same impulses that drive the rest of us. The changed times really are calling them to Mordor. Keep reading to find out why.

The War
Saddam’s capture has all but trumped the US casualties. His capture appears to be sufficient justification in the minds of many (mostly white males) for all the blatant lies upon which the war was based. Iraq wasn’t involved in 9/11? “Well, maybe not but we got Saddam.” There really were no WMDs? “Well, maybe not but we got Saddam.” Iraq wasn’t any kind of a threat at all? “Well, maybe not but we got Saddam.” This attitude, I believe, goes much further than the refusal to believe that blatant government lies caused and is now causing all this carnage. I think it’s more related to the outright worship of winning at all costs that this society has so enthusiastically embraced. People were mad when the Iraq War was perceived as a losing effort. After all we’re the US of A! We’re winners! We’re smarter than those camel jockeys! Now that we got the head guy we really are winners. The killing, the suffering, the enormous cost is irrelevant to the emotional high of winning.

Religion and the American Dream
People unquestioningly assume that religion is a good thing. People assume that ethics and morality stem directly from religion. Better yet, people love it when one wears religion on one’s sleeve. They perceive such braying as evidence the brayer is conscious of ethics and morality and that their behavior is affected for the better by it. The brayer has a great deal of personal piety and can, therefore, be trusted. Moreover, if that brayer is a winner, perhaps a warrior winner, then it’s concrete evidence that “god” has blessed him and that he is indeed moral and ethical and can be trusted with our physical well being. The repukes have effectively leveraged this purely emotional response to religion to their great advantage. It’s interesting that the liberal versions of religion place emphasis on social activism – things like working for justice, turning the other cheek, helping the poor and needy, all activities that require the giving away of the things associated with the great American dream of individualism: the acquisition of personal wealth, property, and power. The personal piety model of religion, conservative religion, requires none of this “bleeding heart” activism. As long as one claims to be religious, attends church regularly, and speaks the proper code words one can have the best of both worlds. As a whole, our society is just not attuned to working seriously for equality, justice, and enlightenment. Why should they when they can have theirs at the expense of someone else and religion itself (via sufficient personal piety) endorses it all. Flipping things would require an attitudinal sea change born of significant painful events. Sadly, I see this highly emotional, powerful issue as Bush’s and there’s just not a lot we can do to counter it in 11 short months.

The Euphoria of Revenge
9/11 has given permission for us as a people to finally extract revenge against those that are different from us. We’ve been longing for it since the Civil Rights era. Since it’s generally taboo to extract such revenge against our fellow citizens (although police brutality activity over the last few years draws the covers back for a peek at what’s still lurking underneath), we can now lash out at foreigners, via governmental permission (pre-emptive war), at who we want, when we want, for whatever reason we want. Easy targets are poor “backwards” countries populated with brown people (Iraq, Iran, Syria, N. Korea). We even extend our hatred and revenge impulses to European countries that may look like us but really aren’t all that like us (France). Bush and his “government” have even given permission to kill brown foreign people for no reason whatsoever (Iraq). Moreover, his personal piety provides the requisite stamp of ethics, morality, and rugged American Individualism on the entire chimera. This is heady, powerful, emotional stuff. It speaks directly to the reptilian portion of our brains. It tells us to let go, react emotionally, and we’ll be protected here on earth and later in “heaven”. Logic and rational discussion just can’t counter-act the ennobled mob.

Turning things around sufficiently to win in 2004 will require an event or events that will snap the public back to the reality of what they’re contemplating. Another large-scale terrorist attack might do it. An economic melt-down might do it. Troops in the street gunning down unarmed citizens might do it. All highly unlikely. At this point I don’t expect the citizenry to react other than emotionally at the ballot box. Bush is giving people what their reptilian brains so desperately want by promising them the euphoria of the fight, enough booty for everyone, and the explicit permission to give in and reap the riches.

The long, dark night begins.