A Modest Proposal

There needs to be a selection on every ballot that reads “None of the above”. If “None of the above” wins the election, then there is another election, only this time all the candidates that were on the previous ballot are banned from running. If we had such an option, I know how I’d be voting in November.

I won’t disrespect either candidate by sharing my opinion of them in this public forum. I don’t think either one will be the kind of president that I want leading our country. I am upset that I am being forced to vote for someone just because I believe that they are the lesser of two evils. I don’t think that this is what our founding fathers had in mind when they created our great republic.

The situation has gotten this way slowly over time. We have allowed our news channels to become more about entertainment than information. Even so, things were already bad a century ago when Mark Twain made this comment on the state of the press.

If you don’t read the newspaper, you’re uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you’re mis-informed.   — Mark Twain

Our news media have one goal, to engage our attention so that we watch the advertising so that they make money. They don’t care if they cover the important events in the world. They love the current campaign because everyone is so agitated by it that they are watching just to see what will happen next. Meanwhile the advertising dollars are rolling in.

I guess we get the politicians we deserve. The way we treat our politicians, the only people that run for office are usually criminals and/or megalomaniacs. Anyone with sense enough to be a statesman wouldn’t put up with the abuse that we put our candidates for public office through.

I’ll vote in November. I won’t let the lousy quality of the ballot disenfranchise me. But I  hope we can do better the next time we elect a president. If there is a next time.