The political circus here in the USA is in full swing!
Not really interested in getting into the political philosophy of it all — I have long since grown weary of all the name-calling and mudslinging — more concerned with the overall approach of things political in this country.
For example — and this is foremost on my mind, after sifting through my inbox this morning — political campaigns seem to have absolutely no limits on how much they can spam potential voters.
Clearly, I "got on a mailing list" somewhere, and sometimes I get as much as a dozen strident and "panic filled" messages from a party/candidate within any given 24-hour period. You'd think the whole world was about to END!
But here's the thing: Very little of all that is about the actual politics, it's all about "SEND US MONEY!!!!!"
To be honest — just based on the emails I get — I really don't know anything much about the candidates besides the fact that THEY WANT MONEY!!!
Which is not exactly confidence inspiring.
"If you can just send $47!" they say. $47 is the the lowest amount of a number of options, going up to $1,000 or more.
I'm sorry, but I need that $47; it will pay half my Internet bill. Almost...
I hasten to point out, though, that this isn't just about getting email.
Our actual mailbox is also jam packed with pamphlets and appeals and advertising for political candidates. Poor trees... Entire forests gave their lives so some talking heads could send me a new postcard or mailer, every other day.
And then there are the phone calls.
Clearly, political marketing is somehow exempt from the broader rules of telemarketing and do not have to heed any kind of "do not call list" out there. Or... they are simply circumventing them by having private individuals — aka volunteers — do the calling.
"Can we have just THREE MINUTES of your time to answer this important (and incredibly biased) survey about the US economy?"
No, you may not. Go away.
The amount of money spent every year on political campaigning is probably enough that every single lower income person in the country could get a nice "stimulus check," instead.
Last I checked, about six billion dollars were received by politicians and PACs in 2023. That's a lot of money.
Perhaps I wouldn't even have felt motivated to write this, were it not for the fact pretty much the least talked about thing in this entire shitshow is what each candidate actually represents and stands for.
The best I can determine is that pretty much all candidates run on a platform of "my opponent is a bumbling idiot who'll destroy the country/state/city if elected."
Which actually doesn't tell anyone squat about anything.
But — to bring the bunny back around — it was this same circus, eight years ago, that indirectly led me to discover Hive, because I was just so disgusted with the vitriolic spewing on Facebook and other social media.
Yeah, that's me... trying to find a silver lining!
Thanks for stopping by, and have a great week ahead!
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Created at 2024.10.21 13:45 PDT
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