Political Hype

I am going to open a huge can of worms, here, I think, but what better to do with my time? :)  The other night, I was asked to participate in a short political survey.  I happily complied, for once able to give my opinion in a way that might matter.  The survey consisted of some general questions about my political leanings and which lousy candidate I was most likely to support.  Oops!  Did I say lousy?  Must have slipped out. 

Here is my biggest gripe.   I am a very conservative person, politically, and for the most part, I have been totally disenfranchised.  In the last election, none of the highly touted “conservative” candidates were even close to my political leanings.  In fact, my personal opinion is that our current President was put into office, because there was no significant political difference between him and the other candidate.  The lack of defining political poles caused people to vote for the more charismatic person, and sadly, McCain just didn’t cut the muster.  No surprise there—he’s been sitting on the political fence so long he couldn’t identify with the conservatives.  He was lagging so far behind in the preliminary polls that the higher-ups decided to pair him with Sarah Palin.  Then the ratings soared, but that was a total sham- even if they had won the election, the VP is nothing but a figure head, and has no real bearing on political matters, unless the President becomes incapacitated.  It irked me that so many conservatives wildly ran after the Republican bandwagon when they had been totally betrayed by the same Grand Old Party.

Does no one stand for anything anymore?  Are people afraid to take a stand and instead put up with whatever the GOP dishes out as the latest conservative candidate?  There are other options!  I personally decided to take my stand in the 2008 elections and vote for a third party candidate who had a firm grasp on the conservative principles that I hold dear.  Some who knew of this decision criticized me and told me that I was throwing away my vote, dividing the strong foundation of the GOP candidate, and so on.  If I had it to do over again, I would change nothing.  I would rather vote for someone who stood for what I believe and lose, than choose one of the “lesser of two, three, or even four evils” just to stay on good terms with “evangelical Christians” who are yellow-dog Republicans. 

Am I anti-Republican?  No.  I am however, strongly against those who proclaim themselves to be the next political Superman, and then disappoint us by being no different than the next guy.  So I am issuing a challenge.  Don’t swallow the party rhetoric—get out there, do some research of your own and form your own conclusions about each candidate.  Then get out there and vote!  Our freedoms are falling by the wayside while power-hungry wolves vie for political office. 

The reality is, the media controls the elections.  We all saw how they attacked McCain and Palin, while glorifying Obama.  More recently, they caused the withdrawal of another true conservative candidate. It worked.  It continues to work because people are largely uninformed about the candidates.  It is time that we stand up to the media and vote for what we really believe!  Now, it is unlikely that you will ever be in total agreement with any candidate, but there are several really good, conservative candidates that could be in the running for this year’s upcoming election.
I won’t continue – this blog is not a political one.  However, it is one of my great concerns, and I wanted to voice my opinion.  Don’t be afraid to step out and fight the current.  If enough people fight the current, we can turn the tide!