So, remember when Gen. Saint Petraeus made his first appearance before Congress in the fall? Remember how it was anticipated by the media with all the fanfare of a new Harry Potter novel? Well, he did it again this week. Am I completely off the rails to say that it attracted as much interest as a new collection of Cathy comics?
I feel like we are just so goddamn tired as a nation. Seven years' worth of scripted, stage-managed sheep shows with pre-determined outcomes, seven years of pointing-out-the-obvious critical commentary in response, and seven years of none of it making the slightest difference. At this point we're too tired to put any energy into going through the motions. Media coverage of the recent Petraeus Day was noticeably half-hearted. It's as if they are far too tired to play along with the "Gee, I wonder what he's going to say?" game a second time. My friends over at Crooks & Liars covered it critically, but it's obvious that their hearts aren't in it. There are only so many times one can say the same thing over and over and over again. I think someone wrote a melancholy song about this sort of thing.
I've long been of the opinion that this is all by design; they rely on the fact that Americans will simply get tired of protesting things they can't change. For seven years it has been made perfectly clear that nothing you say, do, or think will have the slightest bearing on the political process. When challenged, people either fight back or withdraw into a shell. Devoted Obama acolytes aside, are a lot of Americans going the latter route? I can't wait to see what a McCain-Clinton race will do to whatever remains of our nation's faith in the efficacy of politics.
vghoul says:
I tend to agree. I'm the most bottomless well of righteous indignation I know, and even I am feeling this Enormous Malaise these part couple of years.
Jeff says:
I have to say, though, that at least we lasted 7 years before we ran out of gas. Is it any wonder so many people like Obama? He just has to say change over and over, and people don't care what else he says.
Furthermore, that Iraq weariness might just hurt McCain in the election. People are tired of hearing about the war and security. That forces him to trot out his oh-so-sorry domestic agenda.
Matthew says:
There's a new collection of Cathy comics?!
Rick says:
I can understand a population being lazy when it comes to bringing about political change, but I don't understand how it can be so lazy in such glaring times. Wasteful spending in an unpopular war and gas prices alone should be enough to make your average local yokel wake up and ask, "Hey, what the fuck's going on here?" We invaded a country with the unspoken intent of pumping it dry, and gas prices have since gone up heinously.
If a population has no control over the political process or a hand in state decision making, isn't that population's government a dictatorship?
vghoul says:
Oh, said yokels do in fact… oh… call the Attorney General's office, for instance, and complain about high gas prices. The problem is that there's a fairly low percentage of those people who are actually interested in an explanation as to (1) why said problem exists (2) why part of it's an inevitable consequence of the economic philosophy they quite possibly voted into power themselves (3) what we can and can't do about it for those reasons (4) what THEY can and can't do about it for those reasons. I know because I've tried to give serious answers to questions such as "why are gas prices so high?" and "why don'tcha'll do somethin' about this shit?", and have found that 90% of the people asking them were doing so only rhetorically.
That is to say, most of the people in question aren't shouting "what the fuck's going on here?" because they actually want to KNOW; they just want someone to "fix" the immediate problem as they see it, which is that they have less disposable income and are having a hard time affording things. Most would rather just be pissed off and blame the government, or the corporations – depending on which end of the political spectrum they fall – than actually have to waste their precious, precious mental energy considering the complexities at hand and engaging in a dialogue about these issues. They just want somebody to yell at so they can feel better in the short-term. Maybe they've given up on aspiring to anything more. Maybe that apathy is what makes dictatorship inevitable. People don't want to be challenged, they want to be pandered to. They don't want leadership, they want marketing.
The really hilarious thing to me is that publicly engaging in political debate with substance seems to be considered far more uncouth than just shouting at people to put things back the way they were [while remaining comfortably ignorant of what that MEANS] like a belligerent child. At least around here – YMMV.