It’s a sunny day in Akron. I’m sitting on a brick wall outside the Summit County Democratic Headquarters, chai latte in hand. I was tempted to stop at Starbucks and use my gift card, but instead I opted to stick it to the man and go for the caribou. Come to think of it, Caribou Coffee might alsobe corporate, but at least they use an edgier font.
Last night I stayed in the most beautiful house. They placed me in a dazzling two-story with a spiral staircase, giant wall-sized artwork gracing each room, and a baby grand piano. It even has one of those magnificent circle driveways leading up to the facade, which makes my car—a 1990 Accord in dusty, fall-from-grace red—seem less than magnificent.
Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about democracy. I’m not particularly equipped to delve into the deeply political implications of the term—my lone venture into the Poli Sci and Law/Jurisprudence departments at Amherst was an LJST course in law and literature, further proof that I’ll use literature to mitigate practically anything. So I’ll fully admit to having an embarrassingly puerile knowledge of politics. But the tenets of democracy, the fundamental application of it…those have been on my mind of late.
In the wake of the VP debate, I heard a lot of people express disappointment that Sarah Palin didn’t majorly screw up. People were expecting (and many of them hoping for) further gaffes along the lines of those already immortalized by Tina Fey.
I don’t think I agree with these people. And that’s not to say I’m not every bit as misanthropic—I very well may be. But to me, what made Biden v. Palin so powerful is that it was, in my opinion, a great debate. Yes, they both edged around certain questions. Yes, they both stretched the truth when it served their point. I can even give credence to the comment made by a close friend of mine that it was like watching a politician debate a high school civics teacher. But the words were fiery, and the passion was there, and that’s what makes politics exciting.
And isn’t that part of what makes a democracy, dare I say it, “fun”? It feeds our innate sense of competition. We want two candidates who are, at least on some levels, evenly matched. Then they struggle, and the best man (or woman) wins. If it’s a total landslide, we feel cheated. That’s the brilliance of debate: two people, on equal standing, pitted against one another. Though content may very well slip, the beauty is in the essence of the form.
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I wrote the first part of this blog post on Sunday. I’m currently in a biblioteca in Puerto Rico, squeezing in a few minutes of internet time while I attempt to salvage my vacation (hitherto thwarted by a variety of disastrous events, ranging from my car motor seizing on a New Jersey highway to Tropical Storm Kyle). It’s an interesting place to be ruminating on democracy, considering that PR is a commonwealth but not a state, and though they get to vote in the primaries, they are excluded from casting a vote in the presidential race.
On my first full night in PR, I flopped down on my hotel bed and watched the second Presidential Debate. If everything I said in the first part of this post was true, then I should have been happy. The candidates seemed evenly matched, physically standing (or sitting) on the same plane, and the form of the Town Meeting is, at least in theory, even more conducive to the democratic ideal.
But I felt a paralyzing sense of discouragement crescendo as the debate raged on. Both men passionately believe they are right; both men promise some sort of salvation to this nation. But who is right and who is wrong? How can you discern what to believe? Now both candidates are advocating a massive surge in government spending, and we are a nation in severe economic crisis. Can we really trust that one of these men holds all the answers?
Also, I find it disconcerting that neither candidate (and for that matter, neither of the VP candidates, either) will ever respond to questions along the lines of, “What don’t you know?” “What would you have to sacrifice?” “What’s not going to work?” Allow me to add one more question here: Why is it so unacceptable to show weakness?
I know why: because the other candidate, and moreover the other candidate’s party, would leap on this opportunity to tear the opponent to shreds.
When I turned off the McCain v. Obama debate, I didn’t feel inspired. I felt uneasy, uncertain, deflated. So I picked up my copy of The Unbearable Lightness of Being, and listened to the patter of a million little drops fall against the tin roof.
It’s a rainy day in Ponce.
