Sit Down You're Rockin' the Boat

I’ve never been one that can handle a lot of unnecessary stress. Call it the OCD German roots or just my inability to stomach endless viewings of the Fox News network, but I, not unlike most people, am tired of the political back and forth. What a wonderful night it was when Obama cast his spell over America with his rallying and beautiful speech. It was in that moment, Democrat and Republican alike, that we were allowed to think about what’s really important. It was in that moment that we were allowed to get excited about our new government, to get excited about the possibilities. I might have even held a Republican’s hand. But now, just a little over a month later as we all check our inboxes for the pink slip of death, we have returned to the inane blather of before.

This is my first major life changing election as a true adult, and thus it’s the first one I really remember (I was involved in the whole Kerry thing, but after his loss, it seems to all have faded, and I try not to think about the Gore/Bush debacle). As a result, it also seems the most aggravating. But as the older family members of mine keep reminding me, and my history textbooks keep telling me, politics have been, and always will be incredibly annoying, made worse by our use of the internet, MSNBC, and all that other jazz that you already know about. Now that Obama is no doubt working tirelessly to figure all this stuff out and keep us together in some mish mash of our former glory, we’re hearing the socialist word again, the big government complaints, and the small government complaints, and the constant anxiety over regulation. I’d like to put all those fears to rest.

Even if Obama is a socialist, which he is not, we could not become a socialist country because of the failed nature of our system. In fact, no president it seems has really been able to accomplish anything of consequence since World War Two. Why? Four years, even eight years, is hardly enough time to enact real change, especially if you have a hefty opposing group sitting in your congress doing its job of checking and balancing your power and over two hundred years of messes to fix. Although I’m entirely hopeful and excited by Obama, it is ridiculous to assume that he will be able to totally and utterly flip this country into something entirely different and contrary to our nature without intense military force reminiscent of the Russian communists circa Stalin.

What about Bush? Didn’t he destroy our country given at least four years? He did, but a nice, clean foundation was built for him to work off of, starting with rise of consumerism and the “what-ev, I’ve got my ipod” mentality that brewed in the 80’s and 90’s and the smarmy conservativeness he claimed to have. And yes, some presidents do great things in the face of adversity, like the New Deal, or Kennedy’s dealings with the Bay of Pigs, and so forth and so on. But those were the days when the country cared, when the country was able to agree in those brief moments when something, anything had to be done. But those were also the times when the majority of the country was white, the majority of the country was Christian, and no one’s shoes were scuffed, even if their feet were run over, at least publicly. It was a time when you could go to church, both elitist and six pack Joe without wondering whether your neighbor was an idiot, a terrorist or, gasp!, gay and how as a result he would bring down the country.

Now, in a time when everyone is searching for an identity and so desperate to hold on to it, when issues are complicated by a multitude of world views, races, genders, and classes, no one can agree, no one can relent. Because relenting no longer makes you smart, it makes you wishy washy, a flip flopper, as Bush so loved to name Kerry.

And so it goes in America where we will never be small or big government, socialist or democratic, because we sit in an endless cycle of buzzwords. Clinton put some minor regulations in place, increasing the government’s “power.” The Bush administration decimated the government by ending all regulation, even on itself. We go back and forth, only perpetuating and sticking a finger in the bursting dam, as other holes leak around us. Instead, I hope Obama will be that rarity of a president who puts politics aside and does something, even if it’s a minor something, to fix the root system itself, and not just pander to fixing the last administration’s mistakes by rocking the boat the other direction. I think he has a pretty good shot, especially when conservatives like Bill Kristol seem just as fed up as me. As he says that the end of a recent New York Times piece,

“I can’t help but admire some of my fellow conservatives’ loyalty to the small-government cause. It reminds me of the nobility of Tennyson’s Light Brigade, as it charges into battle: “Theirs but to do and die.” Maybe it would be better, though, first to reason why.”

Perhaps we can begin something of a hybrid government system where we have just enough gas to keep ourselves individual and innovative, but try to do the right thing at the same time. Yes we can?