Barack Obama. Love him or hate him, he has fought the odds and has used his amazing stage presence and message of change to rally to the forefront of the Democratic party. Now he is leading a charge that will hopefully take him all the way to the White House. This, I think, is common knowledge.
I would start to divide people, however, if I were to say that Obama is the change that our country needs. Some people think so. But even strong supporters’ (and the even stronger opponents’, I might add) thoughts seem to waver on one thing: Obama’s experience.
But, I think it is this lack of experience that makes people so attracted to him. Why should we have someone who knows what he is doing lead the country? Is the job really that hard? Pick up a few phone calls, some international trips and endless runs across the country in Air Force One.
Sounds easy enough to me.
So now the answer is simple. Obama’s rise to political fame makes it apparent that Americans want inexperience. We don’t want somebody who has been in power long, somebody who knows the system or somebody who has been ‘corrupted” by the system. Americans want somebody who is from outside of the system and they want change.
Unfortunately, half of us don’t know what this change is or how it is going to take place.
But, dammit, we want this change. Change from the experience of politics of old. Bring in a new voice that has no executive experience and give him (or her; I wouldn’t want to step on any toes) the reigns. That’s what it seems that people want. People want change even if they don’t know what it’s going to look like or what it may cost them. As long as it is different, and as long as it is change, it is what they want.
Obama rode this wave of change and took down the Clinton political machine not an easy task in and of itself. Clinton was clearly labeled from the start as ‘not change” a stark contrast to Obama’s theme, which has taken him all the way to a historic nomination and beyond.
But now the question has already begun to beg itself: what is Republican Senator John McCain going to do about this need for change, this new American ideal of inexperience?
He’s older than Paris Hilton, Britney Spears and Lindsey Lohan combined (call me out on that one, I don’t care if he can use celebrities, I can as well). So how is hardened veteran McCain going to take this need for change and inexperience and use it for his own campaign?
Sarah Palin.
If this article had run several months ago, everyone would have said ‘Who?” It’s as if McCain went for the least known person, the person that was the tiniest dot on the national stage.
He did it for a reason though, because there is one thing that she certainly brings to the Republican ticket, and it was the one thing that the Republican ticket lacked: inexperience.
McCain has been around the gauntlet. He is a tested and true war hero, who in any other election would probably find himself leading in all of the polls and walking his way right to the White House.
But several things have stumped his ride to political growth, and the new poll numbers have him falling further and further behind his opponent.
So he grabs somebody who can add the one thing he needs: inexperience. With Palin under his proverbial wing, who could not fall in love with the happy little couple?
But now we have two tickets, each able to claim the title of most inexperienced. Because that is, after all, what the voting public wants. We all are, after all, young and uneducated and we pay little attention to politics in general. Everybody knows that the voting public is dense and just flocks to candidates with the best ‘rock star” qualities.
With only a few short weeks left until the polls are closed, the damage is done, and the next president of this great county all decided, it looks like it is all going to come down to which candidate can prove that he has exactly what voters are looking for in a candidate this election.
Inexperience.
And it looks like, at least for this November, you get to vote for the best inexperience that you believe in.
Clark is a member of the class of 2012.
