The Poet's Eye-(first draft) The Big Issues

[Lightning Rod]

Let's look at the serious issues in the presidential race. I mean the ones that really matter and will ultimately decide the contest.

First there is the hair issue. Polls show that the Dems are leading on this issue and the Repubs are, shall we say, receding. Kerry finessed this fight by choosing John Edwards, a Senator with an impeccable hair record, as his running mate.

Then we have the earthshaking matter of who was a better soldier thirty years ago. I shudder to think what would happen if my behavior thirty years ago determined what it would be today. Thirty years ago i was chasing co-eds and taking LSD. Thirty years ago I was in the SDS and my poetry was more incendiary than reflective. If you can remember thirty years ago, would you make the same choices now as you did then?

The wives. The race for first lady has heated up. Do we want the traditional librarian or the foreign billionaire adventuress? Do we want spunky and irreverent, or do we want motherly and supportive? Only the electoral college knows. Expect to see the fashion wars ramping up in the next few weeks.

Ah yes, we have the daughters. Do you think Kerry's daughters are more or less charming and witty and lovable than the Bush daughters? The polls show that it's a dead heat, give or take the margin of error. I think we should have a tag-team mud wrestling match to determine the answer to this question. Put them in skimpy bikinis and let them slug it out in a vat of chocolate pudding. I'm betting on the Bush girls in this one. I'm sure it would be much more entertaining than the dog and pony shows that the candidates will excuse as debates. Besides, I can't get the image out of my mind of Alexandra Kerry in a bikini slick with brown pudding.

The Who Would Your Rather Have a Beer With controversy has also come to the fore. Having a stern jaw and appearing firm and resolute seems to have become the glamour shot of the day. But you also want a leader that can talk plain talk with the boys down at the brake shop, roll his sleeves up. Sure, I know it's an old trick. Anytime you can get a photo-op in front of cops or soldiers or firemen, you can hear the voting machines go ca-ching, ca-ching. But this election is an extreme case. Both parties are looking for the tough guy, one who can protect you from the terrorists. In their conventions the Dems portrayed Kerry as Rambo and the Repubs tried to make G. Bush out to be the Marlboro Man. Who Would You Rather Have a Beer With? This question might decide the race.

The beer issue is tangental to the macho question. This reporter has it on good authority (from unnamed sources) that the third presidential debate will include a pissing contest. Now, I haven't seen the respective members of the two major candidates, so I don't know who has the advantage in this area, but if the pinocchio effect works down there as well as it does on the nose, then Bush is a definite favorite.

Or the flip-flop issue might be the one upon which this election flip-flops....er...turns. The Repubs have been quite successful in putting the flip-flop tattoo on John Kerry. Even though it is simply the nature of politicians to do the flip-flop, I have always assumed it was their native dance, the Bush spin machine has quite effectively and repetitively placed that slipper on Kerry's foot. The picture of all the delegates at the Repub convention waving the flip-flops with Kerry's name on them, props that had no doubt been passed out by Carl Rove himself, was much like Greek theater with the chorus dutifully chanting. Greek theater was very effective and cathartic. So is the flip-flop image. And it's ever so much more fun than talking about funding for education or why prescription drugs cost you a quarter of your income if you are a senior.

Am I missing the pressing questions of whether the Swift Boat Gang is telling the truth or if the fake documents that CBS believed to be authentic were generated by the Demicons or the Republicrats? I know that the capacities of the IBM Selectric in 1972 to make superscripts or who was on this side or that side of the Cambodian border on Christmas in some year during the Vietnam War is of vital importance to some reporters, but not to me.

The Poet's Eye sees that this magic show (our national election) depends on the same thing upon which any magic show depends--a misdirection of attention, and a willing suspension of disbelief. The spin machines in both campaigns are trying to distract you from the real issues. I'm not talking about the issues in your RealityTV lives, but the issues that affect your real lives-- issues like healthcare, jobs, gas prices, corporate rape and why your sons and daughters are dying in an imperial war.

[abcrystcats]

Seems to me you've put your finger on the pulse of America, LRod.

[Lightning Rod]

here is the final version

http://www.stormpages.com/gitdown/Poetseye092304.html