Plants

As the expression goes, I’m acting like I’ve got ants in my pants today. I must have set down at my computer a dozen times and pulled up this newsletter to write a little article for this space and I must have deleted what I wrote the same number of times. I’m sure you’ve all done this sometimes. Fact is, I’m sort of rattled from watching too many presidential primary newscasts. As I watch and try to listen to the interviewers and the candidates and some commentators I find myself saying, “There is less to this than meets the eye.”

The recent conduct of many of our candidates makes me think of little children standing on a street corner hollering at each other and making faces and calling each other bad names and saying that they are liars and I don’t know what all. And one of the kids notices that reporters are watching and that he or she can get their name out there every day if they say something shocking and controversial or maybe extra spicy. They use Twitter and Facebook and call in radio and they employ the ploy of doubling down and making their nonsense even more stupid and I find myself tempted to get right in there with the kids telling them that is time they grew up.

Those politicians are like Barbie Dolls, men and women acting like they have a string in their navel and if you pull it then a tape is released that says the same thing over and over again. If I were a political reporter, God forbid, I would tape about twenty of these sound bites which are stored in a politicians head. Then when I asked a politician a question and he or she started spinning out one of these prepared spiels which has nothing to do with my question, I would have my sound engineer turn out that prerecorded message. I’d show how the candidates are not just redundant, they are also deceitful and boring and elusive.

At these town halls I can see plants, that is, folks planted in an audience by the candidate who are rehearsed to ask a question. Amazingly they get called upon and spin our that magic question. And the candidate looks stunned by the fact that they have been confronted in that manner. And then, sometimes showing a bit of anger, they rise to the occasion with a response that not only answers the question but goes on to show us what a wonderful president that candidate will make and how they have been performing like saints for years, fighting every day for our rights and to eliminate wrongs and stuff like that. Sorry for that rant. I promise you I will endeavor to stay away from that spitting contest we call politics.

I pray that this spittin’ contest settles down and my mood will change and I will realize that there is one candidate is outstanding and one that will bring our nation together.