2004 was a tense time for me. I spent most of that year following RealClearPolitics, Election Projection, and countless other sources in hopes of divining some prediction of who was going to win the presidential election. Words were parsed, and debate body language was scrutinized by experts. Positions were spun, and so was I. My guy had to win at all costs; I couldn't even imagine how anyone would vote for the other guy. As usual, the whole world was at stake. And my guy lost.
2008 was a little better. I was still a bit of a mess by October. The economy was in full astrophysical implosion, and, as usual, the whole world was at stake. Polls went up and down. Debates were had. I trawled my blogs obsessively, and read every experts' exegesis of the tea leaves. Every turn of phrase mattered, but my guy looked pretty good. And he won.
In 2012 I decided to do things differently. The past decade-and-change has been a learning process for everyone who ever had to rely on a newspaper or network TV for their information. Today's media practically comes out of the faucet. Nobody is culturally equipped to deal with it all. Anyone with an opinion can now be labeled an expert, and conventional wisdom can flip at a moment's notice.
There is no way I could be a close observer of this election without losing my mind. So I've established some general principles for survival now, and moving forward. They've really helped me. Maybe they'll help someone else who reads this.
1. Whatever the gaffe, it probably won't matter next week. Campaigns are about fundraising, door-to-door, ads, speeches, baby kissing, and fighting to win the news cycle on an hourly basis for months on end. Does anyone remember anything Newt Gingrich said back in March? One side or another may get some momentary traction out of a given incident, but it is rare that a single moment or turn of phrase will solidify public opinion.
2. Polls are samples. Every single poll brings its own convoluted approach to sampling a small number of people, and then goes on to profess some larger existential truth about our future as a nation. Ignore them. All that matters are the trends. If 20 polls say your guy is winning, that's good. Anything else is mostly meaningless.
3. Hey dog, who's wagging that tail of yours? The media decides the message, and even they disagree. We have no control over pubic perception as individuals. With thousands of media outlets, each variously customized for our biases, competing for our attention, and selling ad space, it's no wonder that it's not the viewer who decides who won a debate. You can't change that. It doesn't matter what I think, only who I donate time and money to, and ultimately how I vote.
4. No matter how expert the opinion, they're often wrong. This is really a corollary to Number 3. People who are actually paid for their opinions aren't paid if they're right. Nobody even remembers that. They're paid to have an interesting enough opinion to keep you watching through the commercial break. Even the people you trust the most are often wrong about what the public cares about. They're subject to the same noise and hive mentality we all are.
5. Life goes on. Don't expect politics to end just because your guy won or lost. Anyone who's paid attention and been passionate about politics has endured crushing defeats. Forget politics. The world is a tough place, but it used to be a lot worse. In the long run it's mostly gotten better. No matter who is president on November 8, the sun will still rise, the world's hardships will remain, and there will still be work to be done.
