Conventional Wisdom

On the eve of the Democratic National Convention, Barack Obama has selected Sen. Joe Biden as his running mate. The Obama campaign likely had a list of several potential running mates that they "vetted" to make sure there were no "surprises in the closet" that could harm Obama's chance in the November election. Although John McCain has yet to announce his running mate, be assured that the McCain campaigin is also "vetting" a list of potential choices.

I am old enough to remember when the national pary conventions meant something. Platforms were developed. Difference making speaches were delivered. Unfortunately, the national conventions have evolved from being proactive to being reactive. The conventions no longer put our best candidates forward. The goal of the Democratice National Convention is not to put forth the reasons to vote for Obama and the Democratic platform. The goal is to make John McCain and the Republican platform look as poor as possible so that the undecided voters will, by default, vote for Obama. The same goals, with the parties reversed, will apply to the Rebublican National Convention.

The millions of readers of this blog know that I pay a fair amount of attention to Catholic media. I just finished reading a "conservative" Catholic weekly newspaper that had many letters to the editor stating that the only Catholic option is to vote for McCain over Obama. These arguments seem to be an attempt to put a small bandage on a severed limb. Perhaps we should focus on the reasons why so many well-qualified candidates cannot run for major public office because they are not willing to bow to the wishes of well-funded special interest groups. The successful candidates are the ones that have learned how to play the special interest money game. As individual citizens, our choices for President are determined by the special interests. Thus, there are increasing numbers of citizens like me that are rarely pleased with the choices that we have. So, we have become accustomed to voting for the candidate we feel will do the least amount of damage. The political conventions feed into this.