The Experiment

I’ve stayed away from politics these last few weeks in hopes it would all go away. I knew that wouldn’t happen. I did have a nice rest, however, from the belligerent passion of lies and alliances of fabrication and innuendo. Illusion may be a political campaigns best tactic, but it is not a good one for a discerning citizen.

I will not single out one over the other in this election time. They both allude and lie. They both create a contextual reference to untruths, and they both smear the other with inciting rhetoric designed to look like truth and engender fear in those who already dislike one or the other.

The Pollyanna take on all of this is that the ideal of America is better than that. Skullduggery in politics is not new to and in the American political system. Lies aren’t either, and smearing has been around since George Washingon’s days in the White House. We all can deal with the truth if all sides said the truth and nothing but the truth.

Our experience is that the few who have sought the office of President, who used only truth as their campaign ethic have never been elected. We don’t want to hear the truth for it would mean an acknowledgment of our global complicity in duplicitous actions and that is inimical to what we think America is.

It may come as a surprise, but America is not perfect. Democracy is a practice, not an absolute. America is a grand experiment.  People, We The People, comprise democracy and just in case we don't remember it, we are not perfect. YET!

Democratic perfection takes time. Our Founding Fathers knew that and created a system of check and balances so that we could become perfect in time and with mistakes. Given this election cycle, we’ll need a lot more time in our nearly 250 years to become perfect.

The efficacy of truth starts with the self. It spreads upward to those we choose to serve as our representatives. So far, we’ve gotten what we deserve in our candidates. We’ll deal with it. We’ll make the best of it and maybe we’ll think about it next time.

The experiment continues.