How I became politically cynical in 3 easy steps

So ol’ Shukhevych

paid me the courtesy of putting my diary on his favorites list despite the fact that my

content is usually no better than your average disaffected teenager’s diary (but without all

the opposite sex drama).

It’s been a while since I tried writing about anything political.

I figured that I couldn’t say anything that my roommate, Shuk, or a

number of others could say. I don’t have what people call “real ideas” or an “interesting

writing style.” However, I figured I could start with a personal story. I may have posted

something about this months or years ago, but it’s worth hashing out again.

I was fairly

uninterested in politics before coming to grad school. The 2000 election changed that a

little bit. I turned 18 in 1997, so the 2000 election was the first time I could vote for

president. Believe me, I didn’t think I was changing the world back in ’99 when I voted for

senators, so this was an exciting time.

On top of all that, the media pundits insisted

that this would be a very close and important election. Later, I learned that they always

say that no matter how boring or similar the major candidates are, but I digress. I didn’t

have any strongly formed political ideas at the time, but I did know one thing. I didn’t

want to be a one-issue voter like the rest of my family. You see, my family, being of the

middle class Catholic persuasion, typically votes straight Republican in just about any

election worth discussing. The other side represents the baby killers. Sort of as an

afterthought, they’d then go on and talk about how the Republicans want to let you keep more

of your hard earned money.

Hypocritically, I then went on to become a one-issue voter.

Rather than worrying about who wants babies to die, though, I decided to make intelligence

my issue. I figured that I didn’t like either candidate ideologically, so I’d just pick the

one that was less stupid (out of the two major ones… I wasn’t willing to “throw votes

away” just yet). You shouldn’t need a cheat sheet to figure out which one that was.

At

any rate, once word got out who I voted for, I was almost disowned. I didn’t even come out

and say it, but at a family gathering, I was the only one that didn’t enthusiastically

pledge allegiance to the shrub. Despite that, I didn’t much care which way the Florida

thing went, and I went on with my life as usual once Bush took office.

Not long after

that, 9/11 happened. Then came all the unilateral military business. I asked myself,

“Self, aren’t you happy that you didn’t support that clod?” The answer was a resounding

yes. I then asked, “Self, are you convinced that the guy you voted for wouldn’t have done

some similar (or even different) completely stupid thing?” There, I wasn’t so sure.

Despite my misgivings about ol’ W, I became convinced that neither major party tool

would have handled things in the way I want. Major decisions in international and domestic

politics simply aren’t up to me, and what’s worse, the things that politicians do is

completely independent of what they said they’d do while campaigning.

Once I learned that,

I became more politically cynical than I was before. There. That didn’t sound hard, did

it?

Future entries will discuss the ramifications of this cynicism. I will also talk

about various bands and brands of pop I like.

– MC