The world is not perfect

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/18/mitt-romney-taxes-tough-sell-hairball_n_1681636.html

Oh Joy, Oh Joy! Some of the Republican illuminati are not all the enthused by the presumed party nominee Mitt Romney. Obviously this portends that his campaign to unseat President Barack Obama will fail and the progressives will have four more years to change America into their vision of what it should be.

Let there be dancing in the streets. The GOP is not this monolith monster that is going to steam roll over all the “progressive” achievements of the last century and return everyone to slavery.

Since when was the GOP a monolith? Since when were conservatives a united force walking in lockstep? Are we talking social conservatives or fiscal conservatives or religious conservatives or the so-called political conservatives? What about the neo-conservatives? Oh, yes, we must believe they are all cut from the same mold.

Aren’t Christian fundamentalists just like business and corporate fundamentalists? I mean they are fundamentalists, right? Aren’t all fundamentalists exactly alike?

Hello, what world are you living on? Is any group a monolith? You have got to be kidding. So, some of the traditional elite in the Republican Party do not have shivers running down their leg that the Mormon Romney indicating that he walks on water and is the messiah. Does that mean they are just going to go home? I don’t think so.

It is almost an illusion to look at each crack that indicates that maybe somebody doesn’t agree with Romney on X issue or Y issue that doesn’t necessarily translate into that somebody either voting for President Obama or not voting. Wishful thinking more likely.

Who people decide to vote for really is a bit more complex, as well as simpler, than how as candidate stands on this or that issue. While most people might say that some issue made them vote for a candidate, what they really mean is that issue is the they are most cognizant of that tipped the balance of their perception of whom to vote for.

Yes, some people will just vote Democrat as much as some people will never vote Democratic, and vice-versa for the Republicans. But they make up only a slice of the electorate and the bigger slice is in the middle, where the voters muddle through a host of perceptions and considerations until they decide how they are going to vote. Some even flip coins.

The point being, I think, never gloat over what you perceive to be your enemies weaknesses and remember oft times your opponents are adherents to the old mantra that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” at least for this go around.

Also remember that leaders often don’t lead, and don’t always (without the direct application of the threat of physical force) make people vote the way they want them too. That is the secret of the secret ballot. People can, once in the polling booth, cast their ballots relatively anonymously. I am not so sanguine to suggest, however, that people around you are not perceptive enough to figure out for whom you voted. But, then you can always lie. That works too.

The problem is, despite what some people seem to want to think, candidates are not perfect. The world is not perfect and is not about to be perfected, even if progressives think it can be. All candidates have faults, depending on their supporters’ (and opponents’) perspective. Candidates are at best a compromise. They try to bridge the various factions within every political grouping to garner sufficient support at the ballot box to actually win an election. In reality, many voters going into vote metaphorically hold their noses while casting their ballot as the best of the worst.

To fail to recognize this is an indication of how people have become intolerant of compromise, the art of the possible and the heart of a democratic republic.

Like Ben Franklin said, we have given birth to a republic and now the question is after it has grown up, can we keep it one?

But then again, the world is not a perfect place nor will it ever be one.  So much for this random thought.