The politics of disgust

Unfortunately, it's almost time for an election. This means all forms of media (the term airwaves is no longer sufficient) are riddled with the most ridiculous and insane methods of scum-sucking mudslinging that the English language (and sometimes Spanish) can sustain. There are some particularly flashy examples, but I'll let you find those on your own. More up my alley is the creative analysis of all this garbage found mostly on the internet.

One embarrassment is that the British (via BBC Magazine), known for their own mad dirt digging skills, have dubbed our current election season particularly spooky.

I suppose there was a time when candidates asked people to vote for them because they shared a political philosophy. I suppose that time predates modern democracy.

Now, it's vote for me because I'm not a paedophile, or a drunk, or a mistress-choking adulterer, or a moron - all of which members of Congress have been accused of, with varying degrees of veracity, in the last month.

As Mark Twain once said, there is no distinctly American criminal class except Congress.

I certainly agree with the author, and I especially dig Mark Twain's lovely addition. It seems about accurate, and in spite of my belief that the "mistress-choking adulterers" will probably lose, I'm not terribly confident that anyone more decent will when.

But then the president and his former challenger get involved, and it gets worse. From NYT:

When the president of the United States gleefully bathes in the muck to divide Americans into those who love their country and those who don’t, it is destructive to the fabric of the nation he is supposed to be leading.

I feel like that about sums it up. All fear, all lies, all the time. I really wish "freedom from fear" had been written into the Constitution. Maybe that would make campaigning a little nicer.

Is civility too much to ask for? Or do I have to spend my life learning about who fucked whose corrupt, gay, illegitimate pet monkey?