Campaign 2016 – Promises, Promises

Are you all about making America great again? Or would you rather be reigniting the promise of America? Personally, I want to know exactly what kind of political revolution is coming and what do I do if and when it gets here. Gone are the days of change we can believe in since it’s difficult to concretely say if what we believed ever came to fruition; and yet, here we are at the edge of the wildest political showdown our country has seen in years, or maybe ever. 1992 was the year Bill Clinton was dubbed as the Elvis candidate after he played a mean saxophone set on the now defunct Arsenio Hall Show; a late night staple of the 1990’s. No Twitter, no Instagram and no Facebook to promote or downplay those shenanigans and still, America gave him the keys to the White House.

The political landscape has never been of much interest to me, but, I have always been able to say with certainty that I belong to the democratic party, lean toward the left and do not have Fox News in my channel guide. For the most part, those three basic beliefs remain true, so why do I feel like we are about to learn the actual coordinates of the Bermuda Triangle and maybe even be taken there? The amount of distain that today’s candidates feel for each other has reached a new high as debate stages showcase the size of one’s fingers and the elevated levels of sweat of another. This tragic train wreck we and the rest of the world can’t stop watching makes me wonder how the super power we claim to be keeps behaving this way.

Glued to CNN and its pundits, the 24/7 news cycle is alive and well in my home and I suspect in millions of others, the rest are watching Fox News where the spin is a bit skewed on precisely the same volatile circumstances playing out in the United States. Growing up here has not been without it’s challenges, but who can really boast of a perfect country anyway? In recent memory or at least since Clinton, Bill that is, we have gone to war in foreign fields, had two of the world’s tallest towers reduced to ash, watched banks foreclose on us, our friends and neighbors, attempt the survival of the worst recession that nobody wanted to call by its real name, a modern day depression and even got to meet Sarah Palin, who watches Russia for us, from her perch in Alaska, as we took a collective sigh of relief.

As the contest for the highest office rages on, the light at the end of our proverbial tunnel looks dim. The decisions are unclear, the candidates are unlovable and the stance that this country takes is deeply undetermined. It’s the devil we know verses the one we don’t and will democracy truly be our guiding star in this race? As I continue to follow the unfolding slug fest, I crave peace, prosperity and the ability to live in the land of the free without the filth of our political animals landing all over it’s residents.