Back then (I swore never to bore people with those two words...well, there you go) there were few media outlets; radio, television, newspapers and magazines were the only things to help you in making a choice.... plus your own family's political persuasion.
My old man had voted Democratic since FDR and the Great Depression and drove Chevrolets most of his life (except for one year when some car salesman convinced him to purchase a very odd 1957 Packard with a push-button transmission). I followed his footsteps, and brought my view to of life filtered through three plus years of the military and that "just dawning" age of Aquarius and it's attendant image of civil rights and social consciousness.
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(l to r) Me, my grandmother on my fathers side, my father (clutching her hand)
my mother (clutching his hand), my grandmother Heath and my grandfather Heath
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Now? Well, now there is an avalanche of information, a tsunami of advice screamed at us from all sides....The press twists and spins their perception of the candidates looking and sounding so profound from deep within their robes of respectability, and whimper if they are attacked as biased. Show me one network that isn't and I will call you slightly mistaken. No. I will call you a liar.
Magazines and tabloids in vivid colors that leap off the racks and beat you senseless
with what they a
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nd only they know is the REAL truth of Trump or Clinton or whoever is currently on deck.... are in abundance and lurking at the checkout counters.
Television and radio commercials have become back to back vials of poison that , back in the day, would have outraged even a rock.
And then. Then we are beset with the mega information monster of them all.
The internet.
Never in the history of the human race have homo sapiens been faced with the most insidious and toxic force known to man.
Not only is every conceivable thought, jotting, observation, lie and outright falsehood funneled into our homes, but we, ourselves have the ability to vomit our own misanthropic hate into the blogosphere.
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| Those guys. |
We hate the phone calls from masked spin doctors, survey mavens and door to door politicos, hat in hand, looking for your vote. But this is what democracy is. A little song. A little dance. A little seltzer down our pants.
And, though we complain, we all can imagine the alternative. A military coup ala Banana Republic. Thanks in the streets. The red flag of anarchy. Or. One party. One candidate. State run media ( yes, I know they are biased, but we can openly accuse them of that and not fear that men in slouch hats and trench coats will come in the middle of the night and carry us out of homes never to be heard of again.) Big brother staring in his Orwellian way will not be the legacy of this country.
Just the dust settling after the first Tuesday in November has come and gone. And we come out of our 16 month hibernation, blinking in the sun and breathing a sigh of relief. For a few years anyway.
Ah, play Django. Play that Gypsy jazz and we will all dance.
