We all get the kind of government we deserve. If you voted for the winner of the election, that’s good until such time as you feel promises aren’t being kept. If you voted for the loser of the election, that means not enough people in the right places agreed with you, and you have to submit to the system. However, you’re still free to protest, be surprised by some things that are advantageous to you, and wait for next time.

If you didn’t vote at all, then you simply have to accept the government that other people voted for, and you have sacrificed your right to complain about it. If you didn’t vote, you obviously don’t feel strongly about anything enough to try to affect the election. (The US ranks 31st of 50 countries in voter turnout, albeit 22 of them mandate voting, so you could make a case we’re high on the list, but with 40 million not turning out, that number would easily sway an election one way or the other.)

To be somewhat cynical, we have no good metrics for politicians because most of them put their own needs (to stay in power) before their constituents’ needs. I love the newsletter you get two weeks before election day, as though the candidate at any level really cares. If they did, why aren’t the newsletters weekly or monthly? 

And politicians are really like children, trying to take the ball and go home if they don’t get their way. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse up here in Rhode Island honks long and loud about Supreme Court term limits and/or expanding the court to include more justices who share his view. He wouldn’t feel this way if the court had already agreed with his biases. 

Whitehouse will be elected to his fifth Senate term this year, which is 30 years, and he’s never suggested any term limits on the Senate, which would be a far better system than people holding these offices for life. That’s how transparently hypocritical he is.

But so are they all! It’s like the rigged trotting races that took place in the Meadowlands of New Jersey when I was young. Betters simply tried to choose the horse which was rigged to win.

Today, we simply try to choose the politician who’s probably lying the least.