Kottke Nails It

Jason Kottke has hit the nail on the head. People on either side of the political divide really do get caught up in their own little fantasy worlds, realities that only exist in their minds. Neither side is that special nor entirely correct in their point of view. Buy into what you want, but realize that the world is not entirely black and white (or red and blue, in the case here). Just because we have a dual-party system that leaves no room for other points of view does not mean that one can assume that your political-party counterparts are completely evil or dumb or “out there.”

I think I have said it here before that the descriptors “Democrat” or “Republican” have become so polarized that many forget the shades of purple that exist between the two extremes. Do not disparage those who voted unlike you because they are more like you than you think. We are all Americans, and in general, we share the same principles. Unfortunately, our political system requires that every four years, we shuffle into two distinct camps, regardless of the continuum of ideologies that exist outside the artificial categories to which we each ascribe during a Presidential election year. I admire those independents that stay out of the fray, refusing to play game with the somewhat antiquated system America still relies upon.

One last point, my uncle (Karl Rove) does have a finger on the pulse of the nation. He must have realized the above fact and simply narrow-casted a message that drove the religious right to the polls. It worked. Plain and simple. Our political system is a system built on top of another system, a system of peoples of varying beliefs, fears, wants, and needs. Find the weakness of the latter and you can command the former. Send the right messages to the right areas of the country, get your base out to the polls in droves, and you, too, can become The Architect.

When listening to Bush’s acceptance speech at the Ronald Reagan Building, I was quite amused by the strange Matrix-like reference to my uncle as The Architect, as I immediately thought of the mind-bending scene in the second installment of that movie. President Bush said it in such a way that sounded exactly like the character from the machine world that created the Matrix. Anyway, I will have something more on this later today that should prove a bit amusing.