Campaign Fatigue

I am getting really tired of all the campaign ads on tv. I tend to "mute" them. I started by using the mute button on those who were advertizing the rivals of those candidates I know I favor. By now, two weeks before the election, I'm muting them all.

I'm wondering just when it became not only accepted but de rigeur to lie about someone from the other party. I know I often knew I was being lied to during the George W. Bush years when one or another politician would say "We never linked 9/11 with Iraq" or the like -- things that were refuted by videotapes of what I had watched live just months before. But it's gotten out of hand. If it's not an outright lie, it's a misinterpretation of something the interpretation of which should be without question. Reference for example President Obama's birthplace, and his self-identification as a Christian.

I keep waiting for, hoping for, SOMEONE to say to his or her rival, "That's a LIE." Now, of course some have said that -- but it also comes from people who SAY "That's a LIE" when they're accused of saying something that I heard them plainly say! Sometimes I think politicians are bent on making me think I'm crazy.

So I will be VERY happy to go to the polls on Nov. 2 and then have it over and done with. I do have little patience with those -- even my close friends -- who say they won't vote at all because of their disgust with most politicians. If you don't like either candidate for an office, and there's a third party with whom you find agreement, vote for the third-party candidate. If there isn't a third party candidate, try to choose the one who has a couple of issues on which you agree, and vote for that one even if he/she has done or said some things you don't like. Not voting is making a choice -- and letting others choose for you. So vote. We'll get through this campaign season somehow. I trust.