Memory Spans

The election is nearing. We are in the home stretch. In less than a month we will choose, for better or for worse, the next president of the United States. We will decide which path we want for our country's future.

I remain optimistic that President Obama will carry the day. Though his first debate performance was lackluster, there is still time for him to bounce back from that. If Americans tune in for debate two, I'm certain they will see the president expose Mitt Romney for the fraud that he is.

But what is really important is that we don't need the president to do that for us, we should already know better. It is true that most politicians play to their base during the primaries and swing towards the center for general elections. Mitt Romney's etch-a-sketch strategy - while another example of his numerous gaffes - isn't unique to this election, to his candidacy, or to politics. It's a tried and true tactic that has worked before, and may work again come November.

But that's not really the point. While we expect certain measures of of malleability from our politicians, what we have gotten from Mitt Romney is different. We haven't gotten changing attitudes on certain positions; we have gotten a complete 180 on most things. We haven't gotten vague statements that can be interpreted in numerous ways depending on the audience; we have gotten vague details on policy proposals that Mitt is now totally eschewing. Perhaps the reason President Obama seemed to be caught off guard during the debate was because a brand new Mitt Romney showed up, one we have never seen before.

What America needs is a longer memory span. It's bad enough that we let ourselves be seduced by the gospel of trickle down. Do we not remember the Bush years? Do we not remember that Reagan and Clinton raised taxes? Do we not remember that the prescriptions offered by Mitt Romney are the same toxins that created our economic problem?

If we cannot remember the W. Presidency, perhaps at least we can remember this summer's Mitt Romney, but alas, those memories seem to have long since faded as well. As Obama pointed out in the first debate, Mitt Romney had a totally new tax plan than he has had for the last eighteen months. To anyone who was paying attention, this was obvious. But how many of us were paying attention?

If our memory spans were a bit longer we would realize that Mitt Romney isn't just playing the accepted game of political shape-shifter, he is a brand new person with brand new bad ideas. In fact, the old old Mitt Romney, the governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney would be highly preferable to this new incarnation. It's okay when politicians do political jigs, and it is a good thing when politicians examine evidence and facts and come to new conclusions based on said facts.

It is disturbing and troublesome when a candidate who has reinvented himself entirely has a real shot at winning the presidency. Mitt Romney's (current) ideas are bad enough, but the various masks he wears to cover his naked ambition should scare all Americans. Mitt Romney does not believe in anything except his overwhelming desire to be president, and that is not the kind of person we want leading our country.