Fishing in the Tainted Pond of Politics

on Mar 23, 2024

And that's why Garcia lost to Rahm Emanuel, the most terrifying ballet dancer ever to hold elected office.

Garcia (and Sanders) never really stood a chance. Not when it came to making a major impact, anyway. And that political reality -- the reality of entrenchment, of corruption, of whatever you want to call it -- disillusions voters.

Voters know that no sane, principled person can win high public office. And if, somehow, politicians start out that way, either their principles get beaten down or they do.

So, voters are left to fish from a pond full of psychopaths and octogenarians, fish like Sen. Mitch McConnell, who has strokes in the middle of press conferences and then gets shuffled away to his cave, only to be wheeled out for crucial votes about whether to make the congressional dress codes more stringent. McConnell will step down from the Republican leadership, but there's no way he's getting out of the pond entirely, no matter how prune-y his fingers get.

President Joe Biden's acuity seems to be fading and he, also, refuses to leave the water. Biden recently made it through the State of the Union Address unscathed, but you get the feeling he might have been more hopped up on NoDoz and coffee than a college junior cramming for finals.

I'm still voting for him, though, because I have no other choice. If it's not Biden, it's Donald Trump, and diminished and genial beats diminished and crazy any day. Trump (no spring chicken himself) is a catfish, bottom-feeding on voters' worst instincts -- fear, love of celebrity, nativism, anger.

But even I can't avoid the hard truth, that a rematch between Trump and Biden is as distasteful as a bite of Chernobyl fish stew.

The pond, in other words, is full of junk.

We all have more pressing concerns -- our families, our health, our jobs -- and when candidates offer us nothing to get excited about, I don't blame anyone for taking their fishing rods and going home.

To learn more about Georgia Garvey, visit GeorgiaGarvey.com.

----