I had a Kerry/Edwards yard sign in my yard. It was stolen, along with the other Kerry signs in my neighborhood. I’ve only seen one that survived, and it has battle scars. The same is true wherever else I’ve gone in this city since. I’d never put up a political sign before, but this time I felt so strongly about the issues that I decided to.
This election seems to have activated the stupid and naive among the populace, a good example being the Kerry sign thievery. Just how smart would one have to be to realize that if all the Kerry signs disappear it does not mean that only Bush supporters reside in the city? If it’s obvious that the Kerry supporters have been robbed of their signs, it’s just as obvious that it’s Bush supporters who have done it. And, what is going to come to the minds of those who see all those Bush signs? Is it going to be, “Oh, goody, our guy is winning!”? I don’t think so. It’s going to be, “Bush is supported by stupid thieves.”
I could get another sign to replace the stolen one. But, since there are so few Kerry signs still standing in town I figure it would just get stolen as well. So I put a bumper sticker on my car, first time for that too. But, that’s a paltry bit of support, it seems to me. I thought, what else can I do? Well, I’m a writer. I’ll write an election journal, my effort to do more than put a bumper sticker on my car.
Why does it matter that stupid people are doing stupid things like stealing all the Kerry signs? After all, most people can figure this out and aren’t fooled at all by it. It matters because dumb people are allowed to vote. I’m concerned that there may be enough dumb people in America to re-elect a president who is clearly not the best available choice for the job.
The problem isn’t that people mentally incapable of casting an intelligent vote are allowed to vote, but that so many people who can vote aren’t using their own smarts to make decisions about the issues. They are following the advice and instructions of those who have an axe to grind, and that axe is not being sharpened for the benefit of the electorate, to do their thinking for them.
The problem is that people have chosen dumbness, chosen to be stupid. It isn’t that they don’t have the capability to make a wise choice, it’s that they have abdicated the responsibility of doing it for themselves, abdicated the responsibility to adequately gather information on their own and think it through carefully and reasonably. It’s lazy stupidity, lack of personal responsibility stupidity. it’s herd mentality, gossip and innuendo and character assassination susceptibility. It’s third grade clique think. And that scares me.
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