Following the "re-election" of George W. Bush to be president, the Daily Mirror in England had a cover that asked "How can 59,054,087 people be so DUMB?"
With the recent indictment of Tom DeLay, questions regarding Bill Frist's questionable HCA stock sale, the continuing disaster in Iraq, and the disaster in New Orleans, one has to again wonder why so many people voted for Bush.
While his approval rating is dropping towards 40 percent, one wonders what changed the mind of the other 11 percent. Iraq was a disaster last year, the only shocking news about Tom DeLay is that he was actually indicted, there were questions about Frist and HCA before, and Bush has continually pulled resources from the states to send to Iraq, sacrificing the needs of people in America.
But none of that seemed to matter to too many voters last fall, and the Bush administration figured that out. Rather than worry about whether what they were doing was right, the administration followed their beliefs, no matter if they were based on facts or not.
Many voters followed that path. Rather than take a close look at issues, they accepted generalized statements which matched what they wanted to believe, no matter if it was accurate or not. The result was a Bush win.
So the Daily Mirror asked how could so many Americans be so dumb? Easy, the public voted beliefs rather than facts. It's great to have strongly held beliefs but if at the end of the day they are harmful then they need to be examined.
Perhaps the examination has begun.
No comments:
Post a Comment