Yesterday’s Villains Can’t Hold a Candle to Today’s
My first presidential election was in November 1968. Not coincidentally, that was the election that put Richard M. Nixon into his first term in the White House. Did I vote for Nixon? No, my ballot went to the Rev. Otto Schlumpf for President (write-in) and Dick Gregory for Vice President. Now, I can’t even find Schlumpf on the Internet, let alone Wikipedia. On the plus side, I now begin to appreciate some of Nixon’s accomplishments in office.
My political life has been bedeviled with Republicans from the very start. Could things get any worse? The answer is (as usual), yes! After I told all my friends that I would move to Canada is Ronald Reagan got elected President, he got in and stayed for two terms. What do I think of Reagan now? He has improved somewhat in my books; though I still think he was a very flawed President.
Could things get any worse? Yes, indeedy, after eight years of Clinton, we got the worst of them all—at least so far—George W. Bush. At the moment, I still can’t think of anything good to say about this man. Will I ever? I doubt it.
Could things get any worse? I’m afraid so. In 2016, we elect another President, and I have no idea at the present moment wither America’s vast psychoses will lead us. Will it be some Tea Party hack like Rand Paul or Ted Cruz? Or will we get another Obama-like respite until the next lunatic leader? (It seems that the lunatics get worse every ten or twenty years.)
The American voter is certainly no smarter than he or she was in 2000, 1980, 1960, or just about whenever. What troubles me most is that television has not only led to the dumbing-down of the American voter, but it has made all of us more susceptible to distorted electioneering tactics employed by big corporations and their political hirelings.
What is the likelihood that American voters will view attempts to influence their vote via TV with increasing skepticism? Not too good, I’m afraid.
Tarnmoor 
I am chuckling here , I knew the political would get to you there is only so much bs the human mind can hold . In answer to the question can it get worse yes sadly in can .. Not only is TV dumbing down the American voter but the education folks have decided in a lot of places that the study of how this system works is not worth teaching ..
Mea culpa.
It can always get worse, Jim. I have a letter from one of my Cahill ancestors in 1847 discussing the Presidential election and the then current anti-slavery struggle. (He was for abolishing slavery, quite literate, and had elegant handwriting. He thought the politicians to be horribly corrupt.) It can get worse when there is a Holocaust, or a nuclear bomb is dropped on your city because your country is at war, which you had nothing to do with because you are a small child. Or your village is raided and burned by a marauder and even the modest means you have to survive is destroyed: “collateral damage.” The question is, how do we make it better? One way to make it better for ourselves as individuals is by not obsessing on the idiots and turning off the boob tube. Another way is to do something, however small, to make the world tolerable for those around us. I am pretty good at turning off the TV, but I struggle with making the world more tolerable in some small way. Where does the light come from, that helps the human race survive? From within the souls of those who turn away from the evil of the day.
Very nicely expressed, Lynette. Sadly, we have to always remind ourselves that, yes, it can get much worse!