Political Ads Nauseum

*Warning: personal political opinions upcoming*

Not that I could really miss it, but an election is in the offing. One needn't have a calendar to tell it: sniff the air and the definitive smell of the season is unmistakable.

Bullsh**.

I used to be immune to the smell, but that was when I lived on a farm, many moons ago.

And not just from the smell in the air from the audio compost flowing to and fro: but from that compost what's winding up in my voice mail and snail mail, too.

I came home from a family matter to find on my phone several political voice messages: one urging me to vote for or against some local ballot initiative (here in CO, there are almost more ballot initiatives and amendments to clutter the ballots in '06 than there are candidates running for office); another, some local pol running for something (spit-on-the-sidewalk enforcer or some such), urging me to vote for him and even leaving me his home phone number so I can call "anytime" so he can sway my vote. Others urging me to vote yes and no on several of the same amendments.

Phffft.

Tempting as it was to call the one candidate for whatever at 3am and ask if his name was Foley, I resisted the urge. Frankly, it wouldn't matter to me if it was: I ain't no stinking naive punk congressional page. Try that crap with me and I'll tie your ears around the backside of your mangy haid.

Despite my quick and deft handling of the *delete* button on my phone, there's no easy *delete* button for radio and TV these days: political ads are SOPC*. Some are sponsored by the candidates and their campaigns; a good many others are sponsored by those infamous 527s that McCain/Feingold deigned were better for us under their notion of "campaign finance reform".

Thanks, John and Russ. You idiots.

So I get to listen to some group formed out of junkyard methane, prattling on about how the current Colorado Secretary of State is "taking marching orders from the party bosses" and "trampling our civil rights", and demanding that we all rush right down to the Capitol and show our indignation with this "undermining of our constitutional rights" by *gasp* some party appointee of the governor. Or how a candidate running for the congressional seat in my district will, if elected, "take away the Social Security benefit for millions of seniors". And yet how another candidate -- because he's "pro-life" -- is "anti-woman".

Bet his wife and family didn't know he was such a bastard as that, eh? Good thing those 527s are there to set us poor, misguided voters straight. By throwing fact out with the baby AND the bath water, and substituting wholesale lies and character assassination instead. Ocktoberfest should be renamed Ockcompostfest in election cycles. 'Cuz there's a sh**load of it overflowing the radio and TV right now.

And yet, amidst the storm of ca-ca, once in a while something almost pleasantly political comes across. While enroute from Point B back to Point A, I listened in on something rare of late: a political debate between two persons of differing views. Not that the debate itself is rare; but the tone of the debate is what made it rare. It was civil. It wasn't Chris Matthews and Bill O'Reilly going "I can out-smear YOU!"; it was two persons of differing ideologies having a reasoned, thoughtful, rational, INTELLIGENT discussion wherein disagreements were discussed, points made by both were acknowledged, and neither denigrated the other as "mean-spirited", "part of the culture of corruption" or "in league with terrorists and traitors".

Hatemongers on the Left and Right might not have liked hearing it, but I did. To me, it was proof that political civility isn't dead; it's just out of step with the deceitful, assassination-by-fabrication/over-embellishing Michael Moore and Michael Savage crowds.

I know I'm asking for something that isn't practical or entertaining in today's political arena, but just once I'd like to read or hear the following from both opponents about the other: "Hi, I'm so-and-so, and I'm running for such-and-such, just as my worthy opponent is. Personally, I like my opponent: he/she is a good, well-meaning, decent citizen I'd enjoy having a beer with, or could trust my kids with. But on some of the issues, we differ as to how to best get to where we need to be. I believe that my approach is superior to his/hers, and here's why....".

But that's my own version of unrealistic polyanna: political civility will never make it past Moron.org, the DNC, RNC or most 527s: too boring. Political operatives say that attack ads resonate, and you need to make your opponent sound like a blood-sucking ogre:

"Hi. If true freedom and liberty, if world peace and universal good will means anything to you, then you'll elect me instead of that Hitleresque heathen that's running against me. Did you know that at the age of 3, my opponent was a shameless bed-wetter? Or that at the age of four, kicked a cat? And you'd be outraged to know that at the age of 7, the devil incarnate farted in church, and blamed his/her sister! In college, this lowlife, scum-sucking naziphile actually drank alcohol and had sex with a hamster! Worse, he/she killed Kenny! That BASTARD/BITCH!

If you elect him/her, this is what you'll bring down upon unenlightened, progressive civilization: an end to Social Security, school lunch programs, health care for indigent and the poor; violating the voting rights of millions of illegal aliens, dead people and the unregistered, by -- gasp -- requiring that a valid ID be presented to vote; poisoning of the air and water and the paving over of rainforests and wetlands; wire-tapping of wrongly-accused criminals and persons unfairly profiled as potential terrorists; re-enslavement of minorities and women; vast, unimaginable increases in putting education over touchy-feely progressive indoctrination in the schools; ever-increasing corporate welfare for Halliburton and the military industrial complex; and run-amok talk of folks having to be self-responsible and accountable for their actions!

STOP IT, STOP IT, STOP IT!

WHAT CAN YOU DO TO STOP THIS SHAMELESS ASSAULT ON FREEDOM AND THE NEW DEAL?

Elect ME, instead. I, and I alone, can save you from a fate akin to returning to the 1950s! The McCarthyesque 1950s! Just imagine: if you elect my hideous opponent, No IPods! No Blackberries! No bluetooths! No laptop computers and cell phones! Back to black and white TV and I Love Lucy!

Vote for ME before it's TOO LATE!

I am me, and I approve this waaaaaaaaaaaay over-the-top message. Paid for by Moron.org, under the guise of some 527 group with a "good fuzzies" sounding name.

Yeah, I know: fat chance that my preference will win out over the above example. That's simply how the way the game is played. By over-the-toppers on both sides.

Guess I'll just hold my nose and wait to go vote.

And then only ONCE, ACORN (and that means one vote per legally REGISTERED voter, ACORN, not one vote per real or imagined biological entity, regardless of dead or alive, citizen, cartoon character or pet).

* Standard Operating Procedural Crap