Zander's Inside Voice

(Today I am ignoring the prompt that asked me about my favorite place to visit. I refuse to be derailed by WP’s writing prompt right now, but maybe I will answer that later.)

So my question is when did when did critical thinking become a liability? Why is intelligence looked down upon in some circles? Why is speaking your (unintelligible) mind a good thing? I try to steer clear of politics on here because I don’t want to write about that much. It’s boring and divisive and that’s now really what excites me about writing. But today I have to ask these questions because my mind is blown by the Senate runoff election in Georgia between Raphael Warnock and Herschel Walker.

Before we even talk about the actual issues and which side each man falls on, I have to wonder when we lost the ability to determine someone was unfit to hold office. We have some seriously old people in government here in the US, and I think that’s a problem regardless of party. Why are 80+ year old people running a government for country that is so much younger than that? How can someone born so long ago legislate on things they barely understand? The president is too old, party leaders are too old, and yet someone keeps voting for them. Why? I don’t think there should be a maximum age, but these people should have been replace a couple decades ago.

Some of the nonsense that people speak about while running for office makes no sense. Vampires and werewolves? Cabals of cannibalistic celebrities who eat babies? The long dead son of an even longer dead president coming back to life to anoint the one true leader of this country? What the actual fuck is that? People believing that a tv doctor is fit to run for Senate? Obviously I know Ronald Reagan and Jesse Ventura were celebrities before they became politicians and I don’t even believe that celebrities should NOT be politicians. But I do believe there should be some sort of process to make sure celebrities and everyone else, honestly, are up to the job. Not whether they look good enough to be on tv, or not whether they believe exactly what you believe, or can parrot the party line, but can they actually work well with other people, speak intelligently about their beliefs, and are they healthy enough. I think everyone should have to go through a health examination before they take office. And everyone should have to disclose financial information, including stocks. While they are in office, they are not able to do anything in the stock market. Their portfolio is frozen or all trades must be disclosed to the public.

I am completely baffled how and why 1.7 million Georgians voted for Walker. Fake police badge, cleaning dirty China air, being forced to claim children that are indeed his are just a few examples of the craziness that has occurred. But I am starting to think that maybe some people want someone who will just vote Republican no matter what. Someone who won’t stop and think if something actually makes sense for his constituents. Someone who doesn’t really understand how it works in government. But to get that person voted in, pick someone who was good name recognition in a state they’ve previously lived in. A hometown boy that people will recognize. As long as he’s willing to just push the R button instead of the D button, he’s all good.

And that, my friends, is the problem. They think we are stupid. They think we don’t deserve actual representation. They’ve convinced all of us that we fall under the R or the D, there is no middle, there is no more cooperation. It’s us or them, it’s owning the libs or denying the conservatives what they want. It’s all about these hot-button issues while they are working behind the scenes to sell out ALL of us ordinary people. AND WE ARE VOTING THEM INTO OFFICE. Your politicians don’t care about you, regardless of party. They care about themselves, maintaining their power, and their financial hold over the rest of us. Why else would they be against term limits? Why else would they hide financial information from us? Why else would they not ban insider trading that they are all taking advantage of?

We are stupid to think that we are being fairly represented on either side. None of them care about you.