LABOR DAY AND POLITICS...TODAY'S SOUP

 

 

LABOR DAY AND POLITICS…TODAYS SOUP…

If you can read this, then it means the world has not ended and we are all still here. So, where to start? Having nothing better to discuss, I can always turn to politics, which seems to be on everyone’s mind and will certainly occupy our thoughts and lives for at least another couple of months. The country seems to be evenly divided between the two major parties. It certainly will be interesting to see how all of this turns out and who might emerge as the ultimate winner. What we can expect to see in the coming weeks is a veritable avalanche of mudslinging.

 

The term originated as follows: MUDSLINGING - "wild, unsubstantiated charges; a word, like 'smear,' used to turn an attack back on the attacker. 'Calumniate! Calumniate!' Some of it will always stick,' advised Beaumarchais in 'The Barber of Seville' in 1775. This was based on ancient Latin advice, 'Fortiter calumniari, aliquia adhaerebit,' or 'Throw plenty of dirt and some of it will be sure to stick.' Sometime after the Civil War, 'dirt throwing' picked up some water to become 'mud-throwing,' mud-gunning' and the word that gain pre-eminence, "mud-slinging.' The New York Tribune of April 13, 1876, disagreed with the Latin dictum: 'Mud doesn't stick to Mr. Blaine any better than it does to Bristow. The slander peddlers are having a bad season.'." "Safire's New Political Dictionary" by William Safire (Random House, New York, 1993). Page 471.

 

In our modern society, we’re besieged with news from all points. The radio, newspapers, television, internet, cell phones are all clamoring for content to fill up their otherwise vacant spaces. This political season seems to be taking on the vestige of ‘publish first, verify later’. I’m surprised that one of the parties doesn’t accuse one of the other candidates of being an alien. Perhaps they have and I missed it. And I’m not talking about someone from a foreign country. It seems as if new allegations about all of the major players are being dished out to us on an hour-by-hour basis. No topic is sacred. Family and friends are fair game in the tough world of politics. I‘m reading a book on how politics started when this country was first founded. Little has changed since then. Aaron Burr will always be remembered for having killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel over something Hamilton said about Burr during one of the elections. Mudslinging in those days could be fatal. One had to be careful of the words they spoke. They could indeed cause you death or injury. Duels were quite common in those days and were required in order to restore and maintain one’s honor. If the same standard were in effect today, I suspect that not many people would live long enough to be elected to national office. However, in some cases this might well be a good thing. Wave your hand if you agree with me. Mine is raised, can you see it? No, today it seems that the wildest accusation and rumor are thrown out to us to either believe or disbelieve without any source of substantiation for us to review. One candidate can get away with comments having no basis on Monday and then issue a retraction on Tuesday saying that ‘someone in my staff misspoke’. Of course, that ‘someone’ is never really identified or required to explain where they obtained their daily mud ration. Ai only makes it worse, what is real or unreal anymore? It’s somewhat tiring to sit through all of these and try to sort out what is the real truth. What I’d like to see is a clear explanation from all persons trying to get elected about just HOW they intend to get their reforms put into effect. Having a plan and then making that plan actually become implemented are two different things. One can speak of great things all day long but without the wherewithal to have them become real, they are just so many empty words. I want to see a description of just how these grand solutions can be converted to reality and the timeframe for these to happen. “If elected I promise to turn the Sahara Desert into a jungle” … oh yeah? And just how would you propose to get that accomplished?  Words are cheap, actions are costly. Calling someone names is part of the political process but does little to tell me how we can improve our economy or fix the societal problems that we are faced with in today’s world. And we have plenty of those to go around, don’t we? For my part, I’d like a little more rock and a little less mud.   On a happier note, this is Labor Day weekend, so take a moment to say thanks to the bus driver, mail person, clerk at the grocery, trash guys, nurses, police, military, firemen, road repair crews, gas station employees….all of these most likely have families and kids who put in their solid 8-10-12 hours each day and put up with the lot of us. Then they go home and try to make sense of it all. Not easy to do, and often they are the forgotten people who make our country run each and every day…just tell someone ‘thanks’…won’t hurt and you will feel better for it…. I guarantee you that...    SUBSCRIBE TODAY ..IT’S FREE AND IT MAKES ME HAPPY.   SEE YOU NEXT WEEK…PEARY PERRY