Thou Art A Hypocrite

Long time readers of this blog know that for the most part I mouth off about my local political scene, simply because my local political scene affects me more than the national political scene. However, there have been the rare occasions over the past two years that I've mouthed off about the national scene. Welcome to the rare occasion.

Scenario #1: A champion bursts onto the national stage, promising hope, change and a new beginning by leading the country away from the road to ruin and back to the land of the superpower. The media, worried about their candidate of choice not being elected, do their utmost to change the vox populi by showing what a truly flawed individual the opposition was. Alas, it was for naught as the unwashed and uneducated masses elected their champion.

Scenario #2: A champion burst onto the national stage, promising hope, change and a new beginning by leading the country away from the road of ruin and back to the land of the superpower. The media, worried about their candidate of choice not being elected, do their utmost to squelch the unsavory stories about their favored son and his political beliefs. Alas, it was successful and the washed and properly educated masses elected their champion.

Being the intelligent readers that I know you to be, I'm sure that you can figure who each scenario is talking about. But what if each scenario was reversed? Would you still feel the same way about the content?

What if scenario #1 was instead talking about the Democrats and not the Republicans and/or the Tea Party movement, and scenario #2 was talking about the Republicans and/or the Tea Party movement? Would you still have the same animosity? Of course not.

It's funny how the perception of a scenario changes simply because of what political party is in charge. In the case of scenario #1, the plausible explanation is that in 2000 a lot of people felt that the country was going in the wrong direction and that electing GWB brought the country back to where it was prior to the previous 8 years of Democratic rule.

On the other hand, with scenario #2, a lot of people felt the exactly the same way when they voted for the current president in 2008. There was a lot of anger among the population over the perceived direction that the country was heading in and people wanted a change

Think about this for a moment. The media was gung-ho about scenario #2 because they didn't like the way the country was being run so they decided to do something about it by tapping into that anger and getting their candidate of choice elected. Because it was a Democrat that got elected, in their minds it was a good thing to tap into that voter anger.

But when the shoe is on the other foot, that's where I get confused. Again there is a movement afoot because there is a lot of anger among the population over the perceived direction that the country is heading in and people are looking for a change. But because it's being associated with the Republican party/conservative politics, all of a sudden it's a BAD THING?

Why is it that righteous voter anger among the Democrats is a good thing and yet that same righteous voter anger is a bad thing when it's among Republicans?

Can you honestly sit there and tell me that if the Tea Party movement was going on within the framework of the Democratic party (the one who thought slavery and Jim Crow laws were a good thing and still treat the Black/Hispanic community like slaves when it comes to an election year) you would be doing the same kind of mocking and denigrating of the people involved that you currently do now of the Tea Party movement?

If you answer "Yes" then you're full of shit, pure and simple. Or at the very least, you're the title of this post.

While I may not be a fan of either the Tea Party movement or the Democratic party, I will admit that there are some elements that I do agree with.

Within the Tea Party movement the biggest element I agree with is the fact that ordinary people are shaking up the establishment and doing what most third parties have been unable to do with any degree of success in our country's history: having a more than realistic shot of getting elected.

Within the Democratic party, the biggest element I agree with (at least on the state level) is the fact that even though the current candidate for governor has all kinds of union endorsements and as a mayor of a large city managed to have a good rapport with the local unions in order to get things done, he is actually promoting fiscal responsibility (like CUTTING SPENDING), which as you know is an extinct animal at the national scene (see Stimulus I and Bailout I for glaring examples).

But overall, shouldn't we be happy about how people who are fed up with the way the country is being run are finally getting off their fat lazy ass to do something about it?

After all, voter apathy is what got us into this mess, should voter stimulation get us out of this?

I mean, wasn't 49% of the electoral voting in the 2008 Presidential election a good indicator that people wanted change? If 49% of the electoral voting was a good thing then, why are people making it out to be a bad thing now?