Crazy Be Crazy: Politics, Apathy, And Michele Bachmann

Call me crazy, but I am WAY more excited to watch the utterly insane Michele Bachmann (the link is great, if a tiny bit NSFW) give the Republican rebuttal than I am to watch Obama's actual State of the Union address tonight. I mean, she's crazy. Scary… but just plain out there, which should hopefully provide lots of fun for everyone to pick through!

I can't quite pin down why, but I'm just not so very excited about the State of the Union address tonight. Maybe it's because I don't expect to hear anything good (or anything at all) about the things I care about: LGBT equality, healthcare, and education. Maybe it's because I'm afraid the President will spend his time pandering to the Right. Or maybe it's because I'm starting to care less and less about politics of late.

Ah… ye old political apathy. The most vile villain of all campaign managers! If someone doesn't win an election, they blame it on voter apathy. Obviously it's the voters fault that the politicians can't seem to excite them anymore. Perhaps AstraZeneca can come up with a political Viagra to help out with that problem…

But I'm having a hard time wondering why I should get so passionate right now. I was passionate during the Bush era because he was actively working against my interests. I was passionate during the 2008 election because the alternative to Obama would likely have put me on a big game preserve for future hunting shenanigans. I was passionate during the Prop 8 lead up because it could directly affect me.

Or maybe it was just because I was in my early 20's. Who knows?

What I do know is that right now I don't feel driven to fight and care deeply about politics. I've accepted that nothing good will be accomplished in the next two years, if anything is accomplished at all, at least on a Federal level. In city politics, I should be fired up about the mayoral campaign, but really… in a city where the mayor just tears down private property in the middle of the night and gets away with it, does what I want really matter? Yes, the Rahm situation is quit hysterical, but all the other candidates are laughably under-funded and under-impassioned.

So while I realize that I might be called a "bad citizen" by some of my more politically motivated friends for just not caring about the state of political affairs at the moment, I just don't see the point in getting all wrapped up in something that ultimately won't lead anywhere. Rahm will go all Bush v Gore if he needs to steal win the election here in Chicago and nothing is going to happen on a Federal level except a bunch of posturing. And none of that gets my belly all tickly at all. I mean really, Mitch McConnell strutting his stuff usually results in explosive vomit on my end.

In the meantime, I am more than happy to sit back and watch a crazy woman be crazy on a national scale. Believe me, her rebuttal will be the most entertaining thing on TV tonight, and I just can't wait!

Change.Now Please

Lets jump back to the discussion of Leadership, if you don't mind. While on my Holiday vacation to my familial home town, I was able to hang out with my of my friends that haven't moved away from that hell-hole for one reason or another. The topic veered off in to politics, as is too often the case with my friends (OK, maybe it's my fault, but still...). While the political discussion usually seems predictable (we have one Libertarian, one socially-liberal Republican, one hard Democrat, and my crazy ass left-leaning-Democrat-by-default self), this conversation seemed more topical to me owing to my recent thoughts on Leadership in general.Two of my friends, the Democrat and the Libertarian, were talking about the general malaise that seems to be affecting our population. Their case-in-point was the recent re-election of Douchebag Council Chairman Mitch McConnell. It was their contention that there simply weren't enough people that didn't like him to force him out of office, and because of this, he can afford to completely disregard us liberals because we were an insignificant voter base. My contention, however, was that there are indeed enough people within his district to get him booted, but those people have no clear leader and therefore no direction.

The thing about these political movements is that it truly only takes a few percentage points to change things. Let's say Senator McConnell receives 1000 letters a year saying they aren't going to vote for him because of policy A, B, C, or D. 1000 letters, mostly unrelated, mean nothing to a man that normally receives over 60% of the vote. However, if someone were to organize those voters, form a strong coalition with a voice and some direction, that person could easily move from 1000 people that write letters to several percentage points of the vote. Once that happens, you have the ability to say to McConnell "We are 5% of the vote that are organized and working against you. We will vote for your opponent. Good luck making up our votes elsewhere." Then you can get his attention and affect change.

It's clear to me that it's not just the LGBT community that is dieing for Leadership. There is such a hunger for change in our country, it's just up to us now to harness that hunger and make it work for us.