My apologies to Paul Simon but I feel the American Political scene owes us an apology. This should be sung to the tune of “Slip slidin’ away” © Paul Simon

Mud slidin’ today/Mud slidin’ today
You know the more that you’re campaignin’ /The more you’re mud slidin’ away

I know a man/He came to my home town /He wore his passion for the office
Like a corny clown/ He said “my people/I come to you here/I want to change the course of history
Maybe make it all just disappear.

Mud slidin’ today/Mud slidin’ today
You know the more that you’re campaignin’ /The more you’re mud slidin’ away

I know a woman/She lives with strife/This the very words she uses to describe her life
She says “on a good day/I can food shop again”
She said “a bad day’s when I cry in bed /And think of when they might be good again”.

Mud slidin’ today/Mud slidin’ today
You know the more that you’re campaignin’ /The more you’re mud slidin’ away

And I know a man/ Who had a son
He longed to tell him all the battles /That he lost and won
He came a long way/Just to explain/He kissed his boy as he lay sleeping

Then he started looking for work again.
God only knows/Only God understands

Why Obama’s birth and school history/Are out of bounds for the common man
We can’t find jobs/We can’t collect our pay
Believe we’re headin’ toward the future /When we’re really mud-slidin’ away.

Mud slidin’ today/Mud slidin’ today
You know the more that you’re campaignin’ /The more you’re mud slidin’ away.

Obama suggests Romney’s a felon. Romney declares Obama’s a liar.

Way to go guys. That’s what this campaign needs more of: political hacking and coughing rather than addressing the issues having the most impact on the day-to-day lives of the American people.

When in danger, when in doubt; divert from the issues and start name calling. It lets us know what you have to offer. NOTHING!

Why debate the economy when we can complain about the amount of money spent by the candidate’s wives? Why move toward disclosure of stances on topics of national import when we can tout our ability to think outside the box in ways making the public question whether you’ve gone out of your mind or not? Why develop an articulate platform for debate when name-calling works so effectively to stir up emotion; to distract and redirect our attention away from your platform’s weakness and overabundance of guile?

Nobody in this contest (?) has any idea of how to forge their way toward new horizons showing the better elements of a candidate. These guys have “People” (you know, like “have your people call my people and we’ll set something up”, type people ) who cobble together campaign commercials and create vapid talking points making people pay attention to the negative attributes of the opposition.

These people are technicians and public relations specialists paid big bucks to slant the terrain this battle’s going to be fought on for their candidate’s best benefit.  It’s highly partisan and very specific in its application. If the Confederate Army had these guys to develop misinformation, disinformation and the transmission of false information everybody north of the Mason-Dixon Line would be slamming back Juleps and rooting for the Atlanta Braves.

But, the main thing these people do concerns that terrain slant thing. The more slippery the slope, the better. The sharper the incline, the harder to take the preliminary steps necessary to start a drive against the lies. Facts are lost and lies roll downhill at an accelerated pace.

Who loses? We do. We lose because we, at the bottom of the hill in these guys’ assessment of what’s really important, must endure the rumble foretelling the mud-slide to come. The lies grow, the volume hits us and we’re buried beneath a mountainside of nothing that’s good for us.

We become buried beneath the mud-slide known as negative campaigning. It’s deadly to the American dream. We lack substantive leadership in these candidates.

We’re Mud-slidin’ away.

Thanks for listening.