A Gross, Physical Salute to Democracy

Today is election day.  The time each American has the opportunity to partake in our democracy and cast their vote for the future leaders.  According to the media, the red menace is going to be voted back into power based on the under-performance of the Democratically controlled House.

Yes, sports fans, this mid-term, not unlike the 2006 election, is a voter referendum on a pressing issue.  In 2006, we, the people, were tired of endless rhetoric and lack concrete action and planning in Iraq.  This years referendum is a voter critique of the economy and rightly so.  For the most part, the underwhelming performance of the economy in terms of employment and across the board growth is understated.  The unemployment figures, when factoring underemployment are close to 20%.  The housing market, construction, and consumer spending continue to disappoint.  Ironically, the only growth sector is manufacturing according to the ISM survey released earlier this week.

Interestingly, the short-sighted Tea Party movement with its lack of an actual governing plan is enraged with the deficit and the so-called failed stimulus plan.  When it truth, most economists report the stimulus package and deficit spending did not go far enough to pick up the demand slack in the economy.  When they are voted into office, do they really believe reducing the governments role in curing economic conditions will actually be a shot in the arm to the ailing economy?  Any reasonable economist will report that the Federal Reserve Board cannot do any more, and the area of greatest opportunity is fiscal policy (reads deficit spending) by the government.

Lastly and in addition to those inconvenient facts, the GOP is the party, with it's stranglehold on power up to the 2006 election, is the catalyst that drove the nation into this mess.  The fact of the matter is that the Democrats simply did not have enough time and perhaps courage to fix the wrongs in such a short-period of time.  But, in our 24/7 and instant gratification society, the electorate seems to not have the patience for intellectual progress to be made.  After today, we, the people, will have voted back in those officials that cater to the $250K or higher income bracket, which will not help the 'average American', regardless of what the supply side, trickle down proponents say.  The next 2 years will be interesting if nothing else!  When a significant percentage of the electorate bases their vote on 30 second attack ads, we will get what we wanted, which is typically not what we needed.