Change is for the weak
January 8th, 2008 at 00:55
I’m still enjoying the US Presidential race – I’d go as far as saying it’s my second favourite race. After whites.
Really though, it’s great fun to watch. I think back to British politics, and recall how achingly tedious it is comparison. Nick Clegg? Who? David Cameron has said something meaningless, really? Gordon Brown has cracked a smile? Yeah, right.
What I like about this election is that compared to Britain, it’s so very polarised. Because the US is a BIG PLACE, the President can only deal with BIG ISSUES. This means you can easily split the candidates up down the lines: Pro-guns/Anti-guns, Pro-Universal Health Care/Anti-Health Care, Pro-Immigration/Anti-Immigration, Good/Evil. It’s as black and white as an evangelical worldview. In Britain because we’re a small country with a more or less homogenous culture with three clone parties all fighting for a crowded centre ground, the fiercest debate you’re going to get if an argument over the size of tax brackets with inheritance tax. Which is boring.
It’s interesting that all of the candidates are seemingly all campaigning on a platform of “changeâ€- most obviously Obama, as he’s always on about it, but Romney and I think Huckabee, have claimed to be after “change†too. Whilst it’s always nice to challenge the status quo every once in a while, its a bit odd to make “change†your big buzzword.
After all, it’s not as if a candidate would give a speech declaring that “I believe in keeping things the way they are! We’re doing alright at the moment, and besides, I have no new ideas, no policies, and no vision about how to make this country better. I simply want to be President so that people think I’m importantâ€.
And besides, “change†is such a fickle word – its meaning can be, er, changed, and contorted for all sorts of evil means. Just like “Defence industry†means “Evil warmongers†and “Faith-based initiativeâ€, is actually the current US healthcare policy (they don’t need universal health care because they’re just really, really hoping that poor people won’t get ill).
After all – change isn’t always for the better. Look at the change from Coco Pops to Choco Krispies – that was so bad that Kellogg’s had to do a massive U-turn in a blaze of free publicity. Similarly, look at scientists – they keep changing their minds about all sorts, from deciding that Diplodocus actually didn’t raise their necks up, to how evolution works – all this does is discredit them.
In fact, “change†in politics has a terrible track record. Consider the following:
- In 1990, Britain changed its mind and joined the ERM… with disastrous consequences
- In 2003, Britain changed from not going to war in Iraq, to going to war in Iraq… with disastrous consequences
- In 1933, the Nazis changed from not being in power to being in power… and look where that ended up. In fact, Hitler’s entire thing was about “change†– mostly changing minorities into smoke, but change nonetheless.
So I don’t know why this “change†malarkey has so much political capital in America – it’s clearly a doomed ideology. This is why the steadfast values of conservatism are best. Cough.
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