It's More About The Parties Than The Candidates

Ever since I read that the Republicans were including a plank in the party platform stating, in essence, no abortion regardless of the circumstances of the pregnancy and that Romney was going to turn a blind eye to it, I began to realize our fight is more with what the parties stand for than the men running for President.

Neither are the monsters the parties would have us believe. Neither is strong enough to be a monster, but they are what they are.

That people don't find Romney warm and fuzzy isn't nearly as important as the fact he understands how businesses work and business is what drives the economy.  Obama does not. His focus has been on making sure his union backers are well cared for.

Both have wavered on issues.  Their parties have not.  Christian conservatives have hijacked the Republicans by their obstinate and irrational stands on stem cell research, abortion and gay marriage .  The Democrats insist on spending without regard to the debt, government intrusion into just about everything and class warfare.

Both candidates will say whatever is necessary to win votes whether or not they personally believe what they are saying.  I do think it's obvious that Obama is a big government man. It's all he knows.  He has no other experience to draw upon. He has never pretended to be anything but.  Romney is just as obviously a free enterprise man. He has been in the private sector, understands how it works and has had his successes.  He didn't really get himself into trouble until he entered politics and had to say what was needed to win over voters.  It doesn't exactly generate confidence in either man's ability to lead.

We've had three plus years of Obama following the lead of his party, not the other way around.  We've watched Romney morph into whatever was necessary to win his primary.  We haven't a true picture of either of them because they have no convictions of their own to show us.

That brings us to the House and the Senate and who we elect to those offices.  We tend to latch on to buzz words like 'abortion' and 'debt' and 'social security as we know it' rather than substance.  The politicians however seem to latch on to whatever is likely to get them elected.  We lose.

I'm not sure we even have a handle on the issues.  One cannot be informed by reading Tweets or Facebook.  One only gets snippets of a politician's views designed to cater to our fears.

This election business is nasty stuff but we may be castigating the wrong people.  We need to look more closely at the people behind the throne than the men on the throne.  The people behind it are in a far better position to pull it our from under the individual seated upon it.  When that happens you have either the strength of, and I don't mean this as a compliment, of a Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi or the weakness of a Mitch McConnell and John Boehner.  It all depends on who is better at playing the game.

I'm just sorry our country is the board on which this game is being played. The direction of the country depends on who wins, but then you know that much.  The question is do you have enough knowledge to understand the implications?