Relieved that the election is over

I penned (computered) this column before election night on purpose to avoid any bias. Normally I’m as excited as a pig in slop during election season but not this year. This past election burned me out. They started the presidential election process way too early (two years ago) and even then, TV types argued about the dogfight between Rudy Guiliani and Hillary Clinton. A waste of airtime. And I just don’t know who to trust in the television media these days. All they do is holler at each other and say mean things about the candidate they don’t like. Even though everybody talks at once, they don’t say anything. In the old days, Walter Cronkite read me the news and I could have never guessed whether he was liberal or conservative. He would say “And that’s the way it is” and let me form my own opinions. The candidates nowadays present lots of facts, even when they’re fiction. And they fly around so much each day they slip up and forget what state they’re in. Debates used to be relatively civil- now they are boxing matches with the gloves off. The declared winners of debates are the ones who can rhyme the best. Dr. Suess could get elected these days. “I’ve got a wocket in my pocket that to gas prices will sock-it.” People say mean things about each other in commercials. And they show awful pictures of their opponents taken when they were half asleep and having bad hair days. We all hate negative ads but there’s a reason they use them. They work. The only good thing about all those political spots was that- for a while at least- I didn’t have to hear a bunch of guys in a circle in a barn singing the praises of Viagra during commercial breaks. Anybody else receive 14 phone calls in one day asking you to vote for their candidate? They don’t even have the decency to speak to me directly- they hire some computer voice to recite their name 7 or 8 times. I tried to tell the computer guy I had already voted early but he was totally indifferent time after time. And have you ever seen more women involved in the political process than this time around? Not that I’m complaining. Some of the best were females. And it used to be just guy analysts arguing. Now they’ve got those ladies on some show called “The View” shouting and calling each other’s mothers various sorts of bad names. And people eat it up. But I’m not a big fan of the process anymore. I prefer the “good ole days” when candidates kissed a lot of babies and told me what they would do to protect me if there was a mean bear in the woods. Candidates’ personal lives were largely private and nobody cared if they once ran a stop sign or gave somebody a wedgie when they were sixteen years old. In summary, I am proud to be an American and I deeply appreciate the privilege to vote, the opportunity to participate, and the freedom of the press to cover elections. I’ll never forget the sacrifices others made to afford us those rights. But for now, I’m glad this election season is over, despite the return of Viva Viagra to my television.