I have experienced fourteen presidential elections, I think it is. I remember hearing the 1948 results on the radio, but I didn’t really experience that campaign. In every single one of them, more than once, speakers would announce, “This is the most important decision America has ever had to make.”
And, for that speaker and at that time, it was.
I find it totally unproductive to talk about politics to anybody who thinks a presidential race is important. I just saw what I suppose was a repeat Saturday Night Live sketch about Hillary making a speech for her candidacy for the presidency and Obama walking in and taking all the attention and worship. I have said from the word Go that Hillary didn’t stand a chance because she has all the charm of a robot.
If your game is presidential politics, your game is NOT power politics. The president has no power. He is the face which represents whatever is in vogue at the moment. The fate of American policy in Iraq may be decided in a McCain-Obama race, but Iraq makes no difference at all to history. But the election of 1972 was about American policy in Vietnam. McGovern was absolutely destroyed at the polls, and by 1976 his side had won and America had withdrawn from Vietnam.
One famous joke from the 1964 election was, “They told me that if I voted for Goldwater, America would end up in an Asian War. Sure enough, I voted for Goldwater and we DID end up in an Asian War.”
I will mention politics only insofar as it relates to POWER.
#1 by Alan on 02/11/2007 - 4:09 pm
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The Presidential election is hyped up for the sure fact that it is utterly insignificant. When we are told, “This is the most important decision America has ever had to make.” we can rest assure that it is as meaningless as the last most important decision we ever had to make. The real power brokers in Washington put this hype out to distract the electorate, they also tell us we are a democracy and this alone should be enough of a hint, presidential elections are meaningless.
#2 by richard on 02/12/2007 - 8:57 am
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I was lucky enough to meet the great British politician Enoch Powell before he died, the last intellectual to sit in Parliament, and the only one with the courage to speak out against immigration, even back in the 60s. I met him just after Mrs Thatcher had resigned, and I asked him who he thought would be the best person to replace her.
I was still a ‘conservative’ and I thought it was the most important political question of the times. Powell just said, “It makes not the slightest difference”.
I was shocked!
#3 by Elizabeth on 02/15/2007 - 4:27 pm
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I recently moved back to the D.C. area. One of my first stops on my first visit
to the Hill was Lindsey Graham’s office. Go in the front door and it’s just a few
doors down the hall, a straight line from the security desks. I’m not versed in
office placement wisdom (no Hill experience), but, golly, that looks like power
to me.
Yes, I’d much rather be a long-term Senator than President. Those of us who grew
up watching most of the power-wielders in the Senate having Southern accents
usually get the message. A President _might_ have eight years, but a Senator can
be a Senator for 6, 12, 18, 24, 30, 36, etc., years…