Thursday, June 21, 2012

The “unspeakably boring election so far”

2008: McCain vs. Obama.
2012: Romney vs. Obama.


Confession: when I read Roger Simon’s post at Politico this morning titled “The ‘meh’-ing of the president,” I had to Google the meaning of  'meh' in the urban dictionary, and I quote: “An interjection used to imply indifference towards a subject; ‘verbal shrug’.

Well, yeah, the 2012 presidential campaign is boring, but not more so, I would argue, than the general election became in 2008 after the Democratic primary ended, and we were subjected to the sparring between Obama and McCain, spiced up occasionally by Biden’s gaffes and Palin’s naïve pizzaz.

Anyway, Simon’s injection of humor into the boring, if not tragically uninspiring, presidential campaign of 2012 between Obama and Romney offers momentary relief and encourages reflection on our choices this November. Simon asks:

Where is the fun? Where is the excitement? Where is the sheer heart-pounding, loin-stirring, thrill-going-up-the-leg tingle that is the hallmark of a U.S. presidential race?

Nowhere. The New York Times Magazine made it official Sunday on its “Meh List,” which each week catalogs those aspects of American life that are unspeakably boring.

And there it was at No. 3: “The election so far.”

No comments:

Post a Comment