I have been thinking about the fact that most of the people I see in Congress and in the state legislature seem to be fringe people. That is they seem to be people with ideas that are off the chart. They refuse to accept the earth is round. They refuse to accept that science matters. They refuse to believe that the Holocaust happened. They believe women like to be raped. They tell people on welfare that they should just get a better job.
So where are the normal people? Why don’t they run for office? Why are they so reluctant to get into politics? Of course, one of the great obstacles is the money it now takes to run for office and those who are responsible, intelligent, honest people, will not stoop to the level necessary to fund raise. They will not sell their souls to the Insurance lobby, or the gun lobby, or gas and oil lobby. They will not take extreme positions and energize a weird minority. The responsible intelligent people will not make extreme promises in order to get elected. So that leaves open the door for the arrogant, single issue, candidates on either end to run for office.
The second reason seems to be that no self-respecting, nice person would subject herself to the abuse of a campaign To be lied about, to be exposed completely, to have all of your high school mishaps brought up, to have any and every position you took in college now trotted out and twisted just takes a lot more ego strength and self-confidence than most people have. And no one wants their family subjected to all that attacking either
My third possible reason is that who wants to go and try to work with people who will not accept the evidence of past experience? Who wants to try to create good legislature with people who continue to believe that drug testing welfare people is a good idea when the states that have done it have discovered that it is a waste of money. who continue to believe that immigrants get welfare benefits, that most of those on welfare are lazy and don’t work and that most on welfare are blacks. None of those is a fact. Why beat your brains out trying to steer a reasonable course when your opponent continues to believe voter fraud is rampant and the Board of Election has found only one case in 4 million in the 2016 election in your state? It just frustrates one to try to have a conversation with others about abortion when they refuse to see the evidence. Colorado gave out condoms to people and the abortion rate dropped by 50% but the pro-lifers will not encourage the use of condoms. And how do you get a positive economic program when “trickle down” is still championed when it has never worked, and the governor in Minnesota did exactly the opposite and his state has flourished. When the happiest countries in the world are the Scandinavian countries and their tax rates are over 50%. Their schools are the best in the world and they have universal health care.
The evidence is right there and the people in government continue to ignore it. Who would want to go and attempt to do good things the the public welfare against that wall of ignorance?