The Last 48 Hours

*Written by Rob Rimes.

Election Day is less than 48 hours away and by the end of the night on Tuesday, we should know who the winner of the 2012 presidential race is. As of right now, things are in a dead heat. All the polls have both Mitt Romney and Barack Obama dead even. In some – Obama has a one-to-two point lead, in others – Romney has a similar lead, and then there are polls showing both men tied. With everything so close, I must turn to the more accurate indicator of where the political climate is by checking the Electoral College. When it comes down to Electoral Votes, Obama is at 237 against Romney’s 206. So compared to the last time I checked, Obama is starting to pull away from Romney – where just a few weeks ago, Romney was gaining on the president very quickly. With 270 needed to win the election, Barry O is much closer to that magic number than Ol’ Mittens.

So as I predicted way back in 2008, looking forward to 2012, Mitt Romney has been the Republican that has faced Obama in this race and ultimately looks to be on the losing end, potentially allowing Barry to have an eight year presidency. It looks as if my long-shot prediction will most likely be correct. Kudos to my foresight but regardless of whatever happens, it doesn’t matter who wins. I know I’ve been repeatedly saying that for months but as long as people don’t seem to get it, then it is my duty to keep on fucking saying it! It doesn’t matter if the Democrats win or the Republicans win, either way the American people will continue to lose. And the sad part is that people keep buying into the two-party game and still believe, after countless elections, that choosing the lesser of two evils is going to somehow improve our situation. It was Albert Einstein who once said, “Insanity is doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different results.”

It boggles my fucking mind that people en masse still swallow this insanity pill and refuse to see the forest for the trees. I mean, what the fuck?! How can Americans continue to expect different results by doing the exact same thing election after election? How can anyone think that the two big political parties have their best interest at heart? And for those disheartened by all of this, as there are more and more each election cycle, why the fuck don’t you people start educating yourself on this corrupt system that favors just the Republicans and Democrats and learn about the alternatives and support the alternatives in an attempt to oust not just these corrupt bastards but the corrupt system itself? Ultimately, America’s misfortune isn’t due to our elected officials who have ran the country into the ground with their idiotic policies, our misfortune is due to the American people who have set this whole thing on auto-drive, allowing the system to become the beast that it has grown into. We talk about checks and balances in government but the greatest checks and balances system we have in play is the American people through their voice and their vote.

But what about voting? I’m voting for Gary Johnson of the Libertarian Party on Tuesday, as I have said many times over. However, what if there weren’t a Gary Johnson in this election? I supported Ron Paul as much as I could because I believed in his ideals and his principles and knew that he was the only candidate that made sense on nearly all of his policy points. Gary Johnson is the next best thing and has an almost mirrored policy stance to Ron Paul, except for a few minor differences. Because of that and Johnson’s platform being nearly identical to my own, he has my support. But again, what if there weren’t a Gary Johnson still in this race? Well, I’d stay home on voting day. Why? Because I am not going to buy into the idea that I have to vote, especially when the choices are all bad. And truthfully, if the two party system continues to have its way, despite a few promising third party candidates from time to time, we will be left with nothing but bad choices.

We need variety and I mean real variety. Baskin-Robbins realized this and it is why they introduced “31 Flavors” to the marketplace. They knew that people didn’t just want chocolate and vanilla but they wanted a collection of options to taste and try out before settling on the one that makes them happy. In the beginning, politics in America was like Baskin-Robbins, as the country wasn’t dominated by two political parties – there were several. Granted, two always seemed to dominate to some degree, which is fine, but parties were able to split and third parties were able to rise if people weren’t happy with how the major parties were handling things. When Abraham Lincoln, the first Republican president, won the election in 1860, the Republican Party was a third party. At that time, politics in America were dominated by the Democrats and the Whigs. Going even further back, the Democrats, or as they were first called – the Jacksonian Democrats, were created after the split of the Democratic-Republican Party. This split also brought forth the Whigs. In the early days before Democratic-Republican domination, there was the Federalist Party which was the first party to hold the presidency due to John Adams winning the election of 1796. Before Adams, Washington was president with no party association. The point is, all of this happened over the course of 60-70 years. Since then we’ve been stuck with the Democrats and Republicans in control for over 150 years! It’s pretty obvious how that much power over that long period of time could become dangerous and corrupt. And due to that corruption, both parties have a stranglehold on the system. Although, the American people could change that if they truly wanted to.

This will be one of my last articles about the 2012 presidential election. I’ll write about the results and anything else notable that happens. There is actually one more third party debate tomorrow between Gary Johnson and Jill Stein, so I’ll probably have something to say about that as well. However, moving forward, I think I am going to focus my writing energy on analyzing and breaking apart the two-party system, how it came to be and what can be done to conquer the Big Party monopoly. Until America starts climbing that mountain, there isn’t much reason for optimism over the results of any election. I’m not trying to be pessimistic, but that’s just the reality of the situation that we all live in.