[Vision2020] Cleaning Up Politics

[Tom Hansen]

>From Bob Schieffer's commentary on today's "Face the Nation" -

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Cleaning Up Politics
By Bob Schieffer

Well, we are almost there. On Wednesday morning we can all take the
obligatory shower and wash off as much of this election as we can. 

Remember back when the day after the election was a time we celebrated our
favorite candidate's victory or were sad because our favorite lost? 

Now we just want to be sure we didn't get any of it on us. 

And no wonder. If all we knew about the elections is what we learned from
the TV ads, we would think the only people running for public office were
crooks, deviates and fools. 

True, we did have a handful of crooks and two or three deviates in the news.
But they are exceptions. Call me a hopeless romantic, but I still believe
most people who run for office are good people. But don't expect to hear
that from the guy with the raspy voice who seems to narrate all the TV ads. 

A long time ago someone said democracies get the governments they deserve.
But don't we deserve an election process better than this? 

How have we come from a time when every grandmother thought her grandchild
would grow up to be president to an era where you can't find a soul who
wants his or her child to go near politics, let alone run for office? 

May I ask the obvious question: Does that have anything to do with the kind
of campaigns we are now made to suffer? 

We'll never get the government we deserve until we make the hard choices
needed to reform the way we pick our leaders. 

I am Bob Schieffer and I hate these campaign commercials - all of them.

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Seeya at the polls, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"Politicians are like diapers.  They should be changed frequently and for
the same reason."

- Robin Williams