Do people forward you as much political “humor” as they send to me? Since I started publishing this site, I get even more of it.
Just this week, different people sent me the two graphics here. One person sent a batch of anti-Republican stickers asking if I could use them. And then I got a batch of anti-Democratic graphics from another friend, with a note saying, “I didn’t know if you could use any of these graphics on your website or not. Very good bumper stickers.”
I appreciate my friends’ good intentions. I really do. (In fact, a few of you send me things that do turn into article ideas. You know who you are. Thanks.) But politics is already vacuous enough without dumbing it down even further. This isn’t what I want to be about. I don’t want to be “room noise” or “elevator music,” to steal a couple of phrases from an obscure old song.
Simplistic sloganeering such as what you see here doesn’t help anyone. Honestly, I don’t even find it funny. I will gladly take something I disagree with and write about why I think someone is wrong. I realize that some people don’t appreciate that — as was discussed in the comments of that article — but it’s a balance I try to strike between ideas, on the one hand, and attracting new readers, on the other. But most of what I see offered as political discourse today strikes me as the equivalent of children on a playground shouting insults at one another.
For pure ignorance, it’s hard to beat Occupy Wall Street protest signs
Public gets hypocritical politicians because that’s what voters choose
If you’re sure what’s important, everything else seems trivial
A warm and loving heart can finally turn to cold indifference
Out-of-touch Keynesians still think ‘digging ditches’ is a good idea
Don’t believe the words they say: Politicians revert to their incentives
What will you do when ‘electing the right people’ doesn’t change things?
Each unexpected death forces me to confront limits of my own life
Where do we go from here? Things are about to get very interesting