With the two respective party’s conventions nearly upon us, I found myself reflecting on the candidates as ostensibly one will be our next President, for better or for worse.<\/p>\n
One is running on a platform of leadership and experience; the other: hope and change.<\/p>\n
I must admit, the concept of change is<\/em> alluring. Not to steal a line from Obama’s script, but I think we can all agree that a change from politics as\u00a0usual would be nice in our near future and will ultimately be required (read forced) soon enough.<\/p>\n The blockbuster Term Limits<\/em>,\u00a0our own homegrown\u00a0Vince Flynn’s first political thriller stories\u00a0an operative and his father who\u00a0conspire to cleanse our national government of the dead weight of perennial politicians…by murdering them systematically.<\/p>\n So apparently change has a ring to it when you think about all the things\u00a0gone wrong with our government.<\/p>\n Change certainly resonates with Obama’s base. Liberals are always angry, the government perpetually the object of their ire while simultaneously the savior to their plight.<\/p>\n But let’s be clear on one thing. Neither<\/em> candidate represents change.<\/p>\n No longer are the days that having a Republican in office forebodes fiscal restraint (although having a Democrat in office with a Democratically-controlled Congress all but guarantees a fiscal free-for-all).<\/p>\n Furthermore, if one man could<\/em> bring change, it isn’t the President of the United States. McCain is no more a Ronald Regan than Obama is a John F. Kennedy.<\/p>\n Right now McCain and Obama are trying to associate each other with various unsavory characters, the ilk\u00a0that have weaved their way through the lives of most every politician so it\u00a0isn’t hard to do. They are deriding each other for not knowing how many homes one owns or for not knowing how many states there are in America. Obama is accusing McCain of being wealthy when really it’s only relative. McCain should<\/em> be a lot wealthier. As well all know by now – he’s a lot older.<\/p>\n In the end, who knows how much any\u00a0of this will matter. It reminds of the old advertising\u00a0mantra: “We know that half of our spending on advertising is wasted. We just\u00a0don’t know which half.”<\/p>\n The only thing novel about Obama’s candidacy is the color of his skin.\u00a0While\u00a0that shouldn’t be a factor in a\u00a0modern and civil society, it most certainly is for some. Other than that, the more I read about Obama in the media that is\u00a0self-admittedly skewed in his favor, the more I realize that Obama is no less marked by\u00a0political avarice than anyone that has come before him.<\/p>\n Unless you consider Change a life\u00a0spent perfecting the art of mass\u00a0persuasion, the likes of which hasn’t been seen in recent<\/em> history, Obama\u00a0represents no more a Change than McCain. However, while most great leaders possess charisma, charisma doesn’t guarantee\u00a0leadership. In fact, charisma without leadership and integrity is dangerous and that already represents a concern among Obama’s less committed supporters.<\/p>\n As it stands, Obama’s groupies won’t be swayed my McCain’s TV ads any more than McCain’s core will be by Obama’s. The meaty middle is the battleground. Nader will grab some. But the rest will decide in the next few weeks, even at the last moment, or maybe just as likely, stay home and watch TV, go for a walk or read a story to their kids.<\/p>\n The irony: we have two candidates, one with undeniable\u00a0charisma and questionable leadership and one with undeniable leadership and questionable charisma. The election might pivot on this very point.<\/p>\n There has been much talk of a certain dissatisfaction with both<\/em> candidates. Voters seem to want to give them back and get two new ones from the dealer.<\/p>\n Given that scenario, those voters who do show up may find themselves (and there is no better way to say this than the cliche) choosing the lesser of two evils.<\/p>\n They will choose the candidate that represents the least risk to their sensibilities. That, in my mind, is why the polls are leveling off, and why in the end I John McCain will have the advantage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" With the two respective party’s conventions nearly upon us, I found myself reflecting on the candidates as ostensibly one will be our next President, for better or for worse. One is running on a platform of leadership and experience; the other: hope and change. I must admit, the concept of change is alluring. Not to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":228,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-campaign-08"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/228"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3134"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3134\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}