|
"This Week" (with George Stephanopoulos) on ABC is on my TV in the background at the moment... A roundtable discussion with several know-it-alls, including Cokie Roberts and George Will (and I was wondering why I was feeling nauseous :puke:, not to worry, when the program continued with Mister Will doing an interview, I changed the channel) brought up the following notion: that the culture of corruption in government, such as the questionable relationships of lobbyists with members of Congress is the reason so many Americans are turned off to politics. Really, is that it?
George Will argued that even trying to reform the system to remove the "corruption" would make the situation much worse. This after he just tried to pooh pooh the 2 billion dollars spent by lobbyists in their efforts by attempting to make the two billion sound trivial when compared to the trillions of dollars the Congress spends every year. Obviously, a clever(?) but meaningless (perhaps absurd) comparison--at least for purposes of making the two billion seem unimportant--because it should be obvious that the amount spent by Congress not only doesn't make the billions spent by lobbyists seeking to manipulate Congress less important, it makes it all the more important! If for a puny two billion, they can manipulate even a small amount of the trillions spent by the object of their lobbying efforts it's significant (the more they spend, the more significant). As for his other point, that attempting to remove the corruption would cause greater problems--what, should we just accept the corrupting influence on our government? He may not care, or he may be afwaid of the twubble it might cause (yeah, sure), or he may in some way be benefitting from his support of lobbyists, but I would be willing to guess that most Americans care (they may feel helpless--which depends on how willing or able they are to find leadership and take action, but they care).
Anyway, the notion that people aren't politically involved is because our government and leaders are, by and large, corrupt just doesn't seem reasonable to me. Indeed, it should be all the more reason people would finally get involved. Aside from simply disagreeing with their conclusions, considering the source, I'd no doubt have an apriori expectation that any idea espoused by those two (and their ilk) is probably a load of cr_p. I have to wonder why the networks not only let these people speak on air, but actually pay them well to do so. Oh nevermind, I keep forgetting that close to half the people who vote suffer from the same thought disease. So, do you think this idea floated by the Will & Cokie has any merit?
Also, if you don't think much of their notions, then what are the real reasons so many people are so apathetic (uninteresed, passive/impassive) :boring:? Why is it that 50% of the eligible voters didn't even vote in an election as critically important as the 2004 General Election? Why are so many people so completely uninformed, uninterested and uninvolved? A surprisingly large number of people don't even realize that politics has an enormous effect on their lives... How could they not realize this? What is it that occupies their thoughts to the exclusion of such things? Lack of education? Is it they have no contact with politically motivated people? Have they somehow never thought about the issues? Do they assume someone else will take care of it? Do they think they are so powerless there's no point in even trying?
If we can understand the reasons, it might help in finding a way to reach them and stimulate their involvement. Hopefully that's a good idea... If we reach them first with a clear explanation of the real issues... I guess I continue to hope that overall, most Americans really are more reasonable than the unfortunate example we see set by contemporary Republicans (which is just wrong in so many ways it would take a book to begin to fully describe). I hope I'm not being overly-optimistic.
|