Politics
Normally, I avoid discussing politics because, in America, it's a subject that kind of disgusts me and a subject about which people tend to be not-quite-rational.
Normally, I also enjoy listening to NPR for my news if I'm driving somewhere. (I prefer the BBC, but World Service is only on at certain times.) One of the things that irks me about NPR is their coverage of American politics. Currently, the presidential "race" has been getting a lot of coverage--no doubt because of the primaries--and so I've been spending a lot of time listening to MSU student radio whenever NPR's news shows are on. (In the grand scheme of things, listening to the student radio station isn't an awful fate; I've gotten familiar with some surprisingly good popular songs, and I won a call-in contest a couple weeks ago that got me a free pizza!)
Perhaps the thing that bothers me most about media coverage of elections is the talk about "momentum." Personally, I always assumed that I should vote for whoever I think would do the best job at ensuring a fair government that facilitates a just society.* Not all people share those values, but whatever criteria people use to judge the merits of a particular candidate, it really seems like those merit judgments ought to be the basis for voting decisions. Talking of "momentum" seems to imply that people are going to vote for whichever candidate happens to be winning a popularity contest at the time of the election. People voting for whoever other people voted for seems like an awfully bad way to choose a candidate.
For years, I've been hearing people say "I would vote for Kucinich if I thought he actually had a chance of winning." The implication is that they then don't vote for him. Granted, our electoral system is less than ideal. But, I say, if neither you nor anybody else is brave enough to vote for him before he becomes mainstream, then Kucinich isn't going to be a mainstream candidate. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Everyone seems to buy into the assumption that you're throwing your vote away if you vote for a third party, or any other less popular candidate, for that matter. I say you're doing the very opposite of throwing your vote away. By refusing to accept the limited choices that you're told are viable, you're doing something much more important with your vote than either adding it onto a mainstream candidates's heap or just staying home altogether.
Assuming that one were to go with me on this one and decide to vote for a candidate based soley on merit, how would one assess them? I advocate using the internet to look at whatever information you think is important. In fact, there are several websites dedicated to the task:
http://www.vote-smart.org/
This one seems to be the mother lode. Tons of information. Almost overwhelming amounts, really. But it has every candidate, down the fringiest of the fringe, and a standardized test that a lot of candidates take to get their positions down plainly and without any rhetoric.
http://www.selectsmart.com/president/2008.html
I was kind of amused at this one since the site isn't focused on the election per se, but it purports to take into account all the objective issues so you can match yourself up with a candidate. (I'm an 88% match with Kucinich...)
http://www.ontheissues.org/
For the presidential campaign, at least, they have an extensive list of candidates and seem to have a good coverage of their stance on issues, directly backed up by quotes from the candidate.
*(For the record, I call myself a green libertarian. In other words, I support the American ideal that people should be able to do whatever they want unless they're harming someone, but also recognize that things like pollution and poverty are harms and that they're often caused or perpetuated by certain social practices.)