Now that Mitt Romney has named Paul Ryan as his vice-presidential running mate, both parties seem to be viciously attacking one another’s character from a negative point of view. Tricky catch words such as "Romney Hood" and "Obamalony" have been expressed by the Democratic and Republican parties respectively.
Obviously the campaign managers believe that emphasizing negative untruths is just what the American citizens want to hear, or do they really? If you are like me, either in age or political astuteness, you are sick and disgusted with this low, meaningless style of campaigning. In my lifetime, I have observed a steady decline in political respect for the opposing candidate. Hopefully, enough people will express their distaste for this style of campaigning and the trend will reverse itself in this election year.
Trash talk in a lot of athletic contests is tolerated but not condoned by the majority of players or fans. It really has little to do with the final outcome of a game. Strategy and execution of athletic skills are the real determinants of the game’s outcome. A person should ask, "Whatever happened to respecting one’s opponent by displaying good sportsmanship while trying to win the game, or in the political arena as well?"
Hopefully, both parties will soon tire of filling the airways with negative character references and will start to discuss important issues that affect the American citizen. There are real differences in party ideology such as how to reduce the national debt, funding for entitlements, Medicare, education and the military, just to mention a few.
I believe that most politicians underestimate the general intelligence of the American people. Yes, there are people who believe that whatever their party affiliation says is the truth is in fact the truth! But the vast majority of citizens are intelligent enough to filter the various innuendos and come to some cognitive decisions about the real issues at hand. For example, one party states that we are going to run out of funding for Medicare in the near future and, therefore, we drastically need to overhaul the Medicare funding process. Is this truth or is it smoke and mirrors to disguise their political agenda on entitlements?
In reality, the national budget is much like your family budget: You simply have to make choices in how you are going to allocate funds to the various accounts in your budget. It is a matter of priorities. If we live on a fixed income and do not want to cut or reduce spending in certain areas we consider essential, we have to find other ways to increase our income in order to pay for those essentials. For the government or a candidate to advocate raising taxes in order to increase the national income, it would be like committing political suicide. Nevertheless, it may ultimately be a sacrifice that the American citizen has to face in order to stay solvent, free, and live the American dream!