A nation of haters

I think I’ve made it clear in the past that I despise both major political parties in the US and wish I could vote with a “none of the above” option, which if a certain percentage of voters chose, would require all parties to choose new candidates and hold a new election in six weeks.

(At the very least, after being sent back to the drawing board five times, we’d have no government at all and both parties would be out of money. I know this isn’t workable; I’ve also wished we could be drafted for government office the same way we’re drafted for jury duty. You know, you show up at work on Monday morning and tell your boss you won’t be back for four years because you’ve been drafted to the presidency.)

Regardless, we have a recent Pew poll showing that both candidates are being viewed unfavorably and moreover, the individuals who support one candidate are very likely to have an unfavorable view of the other candidate. Undecided voters were more likely to have an unfavorable view of both.

In other words, it seems that people who are undecided remain “not decided” because they think both are lousy, not because they think each candidate has different strengths to offer the country and are trying to figure out which strengths are more in demand at the moment. And the voters who have already decided…hate the other guy. They’re not thinking “We’ll do better with this one than the other,” but rather, “So-and-so will ruin us.”

Hater: A person that develops a strong dislike for another, solely basing their own opinion on personal judgment rather than objective merit. The formation of a hater’s contempt commonly arises from jealously and/or resentment.

I guess we’re a nation of haters. It’s just a question of what you hate.