On Politics

Now that the dust has settled on the elections, no one else really has anything to talk about. So now they're talking about the future of politics, wayyy way off in 2012 and beyond. A lot of these opinions are based on historical context, and many are not originally my own, but things I've been told to believe thus claim as my own. "Lisa: Watch yourself dad, you're the highly suggestible type. Homer: Yes, I am the highly suggestible type."

Mostly, this will be interesting to see how wrong I can be.

The future of the electorate

A breakdown of the electorate map from this past election showed that young people (I think it was age 18-30) voted overwhelmingly for Obama. I think every state was blue, except for Alabama, Georgia, and one or two others. No surprise there, but the wild speculation that has been that the real electorate map will go that same way in 2020. It's about 12 years too early to make that call, but there are other problems with that prediction. Yes, in about 12 years, that 18-30 group will then become the all-powerful 30-42 group (hehe), but we're making a few terrible assumptions.

The most risky assumption is that everyone from that group will remain in the same political affiliation. While it would be cool to see the map go all blue, we already know that that's not going to happen. As this age group gets older, many will undoubtedly start leaning closer to the more conservative side of the spectrum. By the time our age group gets older, we'll have started families and amassed more wealth. People do vote for whoever will serve their best interests, and certainly since conservatives sure like their tax cuts for the wealthy... well, you see my point. (By the way, I may as well point out now that I tend to speak on very broad terms. Not everyone will be massively wealthy. Not everyone will swing the other way. Just make sure that there isn't too much meaning extracted from any of these statements.)

In any case, there are a whole bunch of other factors. We're assuming that everyone from the older generation (e.g. the old white males) who voted republican will all die off within the next 12 years. Also, probably not gonna happen. The now 30-48 group will become the 42-60 group, and will still be alive and kicking. Meanwhile, the current 48-64 group will be in their 60s and 70s. Well, I'm sure you can do the math yourself. Considering that that age group consists of all of the baby boomers, you can bet that they'll wield a crap ton of voting power.

Another big one is simply that there's plenty of chances for a dominant Democratic majority to falter. If the public doesn't see the change that it wants, they'll be more than inclined to vote out the group holding power, regardless of whether they're Republican or Democrat. After all, that's what happened this time around. While this time around, there were a whole litany of complaints (economy, war, just to name a few), next time around, it could be anything. The general sentiment that's been tossed around the internet is, "Don't f*ck it up." Agreed.

In historical context, there's always been an invisible pendulum that swings between liberal and conservative. And like a good pendulum, it swings back and forth in regular intervals of around 10 years. Obviously, in the past decade, the pendulum swung to the right, and I'm sure in the next 8 years or so, the pendulum will stay on the left. The 90's were a Clinton era swing to the left, the 80's were a hard swing to the right. The 70's were just screwed up, but somewhere in there, a republican and a democrat were both in there, but neither for very long. The 60's were definitely liberal, while the 50's went very conservative. So by the time 2020 rolls around, assuming that this loose trend plays out, the nation would actually go Republican. I wouldn't use this trend alone as a rubric on what's going to happen, though.

The future of the political parties

A political party is strong only if it can get the electorate excited. Or, barring that, if they can get everyone to hate the other guys.

The Republican party is now dead, broken apart, and may as well be flushed down the crapper? Sorta. Yes, in several years, the Ted Stevens, the Bushes, and all of the other OWM, or ,old white men (I hate using that term, but it fits), will no longer be the faces of the group. The empire, however, will strike back. This might take a while, and I'm sure that there will be plenty of starts and stumbles along the way. It will need to reinvent itself in order to remain politically relevant. Right now it's not. I'm going to guess that it won't be led by Sarah Palin, but there are a whole bunch of others who will eventually be forced into the national spotlight, if nothing else than for the reason that there's no one better. In the last few years, there hasn't really been anyone to latch on to, to identify with, but I think that it will change. There are already a few names out there, and so long as they can get their names out there, who knows.

The Democrats have a tremendouse opportunity to do some good. Historically, everyone's comparing this moment to 1932. With everything aligned in their favor, I'm sure something similar to 1932 will happen, where they'll pass a whole bunch of programs to get the economy going. A lot of social and economic programs, I hope. Along the way, I'm sure there will be something that they do wrong that they'll be hammered for, but then again, that always happens.

Either way, don't expect the two-party system to go away.

The future of the candidates

McCain has already said publicly that he's not going to try to run again. Smart decision. If I were to guess, he'll run for the Senate again in 2010, commit himself to another 6 year term, and then retire. In 2010, he'll be 74, by the end of that term he'll be 80. Not sure he'd want to stay on for one more after that...

Romney and Huckabee will probably both run again, and both will probably fail.

It'll be fun to watch Sarah Palin run again, but really only because it's so easy to make fun of her. She'll serve another term as governor, and then disappear into relative obscurity.

Hillary probably won't run again. If the first Obama term goes well, obviously, the 2012 election will be his for the taking. If it doesn't go well, then whoever ends up being the Republican candidate will be a shoo-in.

Political catchphrases

Overly used catchphrase: "You bet'cha. "
I'll be honest, I really hadn't heard Sarah Palin use that phrase that much. It wasn't till Tina Fey used it that it became such a caricatured saying.

Awkward catchphrase: "My friends, my friends."
Not so much a catchphrase, as it was an interjection. That was used at the End. Of. Every. Single. Sentence. Obvious enough that this was done to give him a more populist appeal, as if he were talking to the people directly. But the way he heaved his stiff shoulders and stiff elbows every time he talked was a deal-breaker, my friends.

Overall favorite: "Yes we can."
While the words "Hope" and "Change" fit better onto poster sized boards, that phrase best exemplifies what everyone needs at this point. Yes, we do need hope and change. But also we need optimism, the confidence to proceed forward and to make tomorrow a better day.


Tyranny of the majority

Everyone has their opinions about the passing of Prop 8. Whether gay, straight, supportive, non-supportive or apathetic, everyone and their mother has weighed in their own way. I do support gay marriage, and I, too, am sad and really disappointed that it passed. But that's not what I want to talk about. What this underscores is a flaw in direct democracy. Trolls on forums all across the internet have been boasting that democracy has spoken, and everyone else needs to live with it. No. Just no. For one, we don't live in a direct democracy. Two, the results of a popular vote is certainly not the only one that counts, nor is it the final say. One of the reasons that we have a representative democracy, as well as separate branches of government, is to avoid the problem of tyranny of the majority. The phrase "tyranny of the majority" was coined because as soon as you have a 50%+1 scenario, that majority group can impose their interests in a tyrannical manner. Do the interests and opinions of the other 50%-1 suddenly not matter? Constitutional limits and the endless appeals system are put in place to prevent such things from happening. Just because 50%+1 support it, doesn't mean that it's the right thing to do. Inevitably, I have to make reference to the fact that interracial marriage was banned until the courts overturned it, so I may as well mention it now. And yes, the appeals system is in place so that people can address their grievances with the government. Obviously, a counter argument is that we'd then have the "tyranny of the minority," where the result is a disenfranchisement of the majority, so we can't have that either. Nor can power simply go to whomever speaks the loudest, because that just ends up becoming an arms race, where eventually, everyone shouts over each other. The point of all this is that this is not the final word. You know, in order to form a more perfect union. More perfect as in, "It's not quite perfect, but it's the best we've got and we're working on it to make it better."