Hoping for Change
Heh… If this doesn’t summarize the vapidity of those two gasbags, nothing does…
I’m sick of hearing the word “change.” Last night, during the Democratic debate in New Hampshire, we heard it 90 times. Change, change, change. Blah, blah, blah. It’s an utterly empty word. Meaningless. The worst of political rhetoric. The worst of political bullshit. Pure spin. Cynical marketing. Juvenile pandering. ‘I’m change.’ “No, I’m change.’ ‘Are not.’ ‘Am, too.’ Nya, nya, nya.
Oh, just shut up and do something. Or at least say something. And don’t say “hope,” either. Say something about the economy (note that on Facebook — which is overwhelmingly and disproportionately in Obama’s camp — the users wanted to hear a lot more about that). And health care. And education. And technology. And Iraq. And energy. And the environment. Or just tell us what change means.
God bless Charlie Gibson last night — the best moderator on any debate so far, I’d say — who pointed to the emptiness of change when Barack Obama and John Edwards bragged about doing in those evil lobbyists and stopping them from corrupting democracy by buying legislators meals. Charlie pointed out that the only change in the rule is that they can’t buy lawmakers meals while sitting down.
Utterly empty. My God it’s as if I cowrote this post with him. Jarvis goes on to say there’s plenty that actually does need to be changed, and it’s time to stop talking about the concept of change and instead start talking about what actual changes can be made to make life better for Americans.
Imagine that.
Jeff Jarvis is smarter than our Presidential candidates (of course, I already knew that, but still).
Here’s what I want to hear from the candidates:
1. Forgetting the problem of people being uninsured; what are you going to do to see to it that people who are insured get the health care they need?
2. What do you plan to do in Iraq, and how?
3. Aside from scaring the pants off of people and crippling the economy, what real world and popularly viable things are you going to implement to make sure that our environment is protected?
4. What are you going to do to make sure that Social Security is there for me when it comes time for me to retire?
5. What are you going to do to make sure that countries like China stop sending poisoned crap into our country and killing our people?
If anyone wants to talk about change and hope, here’s the way I think we can address both…
I would hope that the candidates would change from talking about meaningless generic concepts and substanceless garbage and hope that all of the candidates will start talking real policy.
The first candidate who does will get my vote.
