D  e  s  e  r  t   E  x  p  o  s  u  r  e        January 2008

BYOB to the Two-Party System

One man's cheap, tawdry affair with the body politic.

It's common knowledge that you shouldn't bring up politics amongst polite company, but it's also accepted that you shouldn't pass gas in an elevator, either. Point being, we do it anyway, which explains why I've chosen this month, the advent of the political primary season, to examine the role of politics in all of our lives. Which is to say, just how exactly did we all get to be cranky, partisan crackpots?

Speaking for myself, I became politically aware in my teenage years. When Congress insisted that I register for the Selective Service, which really wasn't all that "selective" in my opinion, I found the idea of compulsory military service alarming. I knew that a lot of what Congress did concerned politics, and that's the kind of thing you find in newspapers, so I began to pay more attention. My relationship with politics has been less satisfying, however, as the years have passed.

It began innocently enough, like most relationships, filled with excitement and emotion. I remember going to a political speech by a piece of electoral wood named John Anderson, a pie-eyed ex-Republican idealist running against Reagan and Carter in 1980. I liked him because he had really nice hair. When he proposed adding a 50 cents per gallon tax to gasoline, however, he lost the vote of this minimum-wage burger-flipping college student, and I voted for Reagan instead. Go figure.

That didn't diminish my infatuation with politics, however. In fact, I took some political science classes at New Mexico State, and quickly discovered that being a conservative on campus is only slightly less repugnant than being a leper. But I enjoyed engaging in political debates, and learned to appreciate the arguments of the other sides. I decided to break up with politics in the early 1990s, though, when I decided that most people who are passionate about politics are either politicians or insufferable windbags. (I'm still a little fuzzy on the differences.)

Sometimes, I still run into politics, and I can quickly fall under the spell of her charms again. It's intriguing and somewhat glamorous to associate with decision-makers, and to hold court with the kingmakers. But after a few minutes of small talk, politics always shows an ugly side, and the best I can hope for is to get drunk and feel melancholy about the ideal of a body politic that never existed. Politics takes advantage of me and I wake up feeling dirty and cheap. Just like breaking up with a lover who still comes by for casual nookie, getting back into bed with politics is easy to do. Either way, it winds up in tears and recriminations. The only difference is that politics won't take all your stuff, max out your credit cards and tell all your friends that you're a worthless meat-sock.

Becoming bitter about the political process has its benefits. First, no prospective candidate can penetrate my force field of cynicism and indifference. The decision process becomes so much easier when you accept the fact that no matter which way you vote, the candidate is a weasel. Second, when you realize how banal and vacuous the news coverage is, you can have lots of fun watching the media circus. Pop up some corn and call in the kids, because nothing's as fun as watching deep, important political analyses from bubble-headed, bleached-blonde talking heads on the news channels! Somewhere along the line, selecting a candidate became as much fun as reading People magazine, and we became fans instead of constituents. Probably not what our constitutional forefathers had in mind.

Speaking of those ol' powder-wigged patriarchs, it's my belief that things really haven't changed in 200 years. It's easy to get downhearted about the current political environment, and think that the republic is riding greased rails to Hell, but history begs to differ. Partisanship and predictions of graft, greed and the imminent collapse of democracy have always existed in the American process, going back to George Washington and the first Continental Congress. We idealize figures like Washington, Lincoln and Kennedy when, at the time, their clay-like feet were under constant political scrutiny. It's only with the passage of time that leaders become idealized, because there can never be a contemporary political hero.

Today's voter has a right to be jaded and unreasonable. We've been taught to suspect ulterior motives from the other side of the aisle, and to proclaim unswerving faith in our personal beliefs. By doing so, we polarize the issue, dividing groups into neat little groups of "us" and "them." As we all know, if you're not one of "us," you're one of "them," and therefore completely without any practical use to "us."

Maybe it's time to realize that our system is run by well-mannered zealots, irrational absolutists who cannot allow for any other point of view or compromise of their sacred beliefs, and they're counting on us to lose interest. The majority of us, the everyday people pumping their own gas and struggling to raise good kids in the age of Britney, can't dedicate the passion to the system that the zealots can. Therefore, a well-funded and vocal minority can assume control of the process, which explains why the American Bar Association continues to block tort reform that would ameliorate medical costs, why we are increasingly denied access to public lands, and why it's OK for assault rifles to be sold to the public.

Here's my dirty little secret: I'm still seeing politics on the side. We meet in clandestine fashion every once in a while, and engage in our shameful little affair. Like a man with uncontrollable urges, I can't help myself, and each time the relationship reignites, it always leaves me feeling bad afterwards — but only because I can't match the level of passion of the zealots. I have a feeling, however, that if we all were to get involved with politics, and could remove the stigma of shame from the relationship, that the common man's voice would lend relevance to the process again, and things would improve for all of us. But that's overly optimistic for a cynical, partisan crackpot like me — right?