Don't we have better things to talk about?

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

I hear a lot people talk about "being political". Yet all they seem to talk about is:

Did you hear what Rush Limbaugh said?
Did you hear what Ann Coulter said?
Did you hear what happened at the Tea Party Convention?
Did you know that this one guy was mean to another guy?
Have you seen the latest thing on the Fox News?
OMG Jon Stewart totally pwned some guy!

Wait, what happened to the politics? It is strange that as a country we devote a considerable amount of our time and energy into arguing about who we/each other are. But what does that have to do with politics? Have we become so atrophied by identity-issues that we are confusing one for the other? What is the most important thing here? Whether or not side X are really like the Nazis? Whether or not we are the best side?

I don't get it. Can someone help me out here?

Comments

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

It may be the nature of the forum. I imagine most people go through these LJ pages for a few minutes diversion. I'm actually impressed with what one does find here - a lot of bored, restless people, I guess. ;)

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

I'm not speaking so much about this forum specifically. In general, we devote air-time and dollars to arguing about the word "socialist", for instance. Who cares, really? Am I socialist? I don't know, am I? So?

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

Perhaps my observation extends to the general public as well. Most of us are not professionally engaged in politcs, so that a lot of the general discussion is thin and more saucy than substantive. As for those who are more seriously engaged, such as the Teabaggers, they may find it useful to keep the subject down to its lowest common denominaotor, and just try to hit the 'fear' buttons, if it will help to move the polls and get people to vote their way.

Yes, you are...

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

... a socialist. Everyone is a socialist of one stripe or another. Even people who claim that they are against "socialism" espouse a social policy of a sort.

[mahnmut.livejournal.com]

I assume you haven't checked through the hall of fame (http://community.livejournal.com/talk_politics/tag/recommended) yet, then?

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

I was speaking of LJ in general. In LJ, this community and its progenitor, politics forum, may be the most substantive, more than enough for me, that's for sure, and it's probably on a par higher than what we find on the 24-7 cable news channels. But there is so much more to be fathomed, and we can be humbled that we (the collective 'we', not just the LJ 'we') don't do much more than scratch the surface, as is suggested by the fact that a comedy show like Jon Stewart's "Daily Show" is such a prime source of political information.