It’s easy to tell the end of summer the year before a presidential election is nigh, because that bothersome quadrennial buzzing noise is back. And no, we’re not talking about candidates riding the Tilt-A-Whirl at the Iowa State Fair after eating pork on a stick.
Every four years, the nation reverberates with a low drone whine about the American presidential election process being too long. Not to mention demeaning, tortuous and more boring than watching varnish harden.
You got to be kidding. This must be a crude attempt at jest. Surely you moonlight as a semi-professional leg puller. Quit asking: “Do we really have to pay attention for a whole year and a half?” The answer is, you betcha’ baby.
The 18 month, 24/7 campaigning is illuminating, illustrative and lucrative for just about everyone. Comedians and the blogosphere. Pundits and pharmaceutical salesmen. Bumper sticker manufacturers. Character assassinators. Bartenders. East Chinese shrimp farmers. Pollsters and soothsayers.
Each and every day, we are witness to at least one of the 17 gazillion grasping GOPers tripping over their own open mouth, sprawling in a manner not unreminiscent of possum roadkill. And on the other side of the information highway, let’s all sit in the shade and watch another little piece of Hillary Clinton get stripped right off the bone.
This is reality TV at its finest. Has anybody ever complained that the Kardashian show has been running too long? Well, yeah. Okay. A little bit. Especially lately.
But for a long time, no, and why not? Because participants keep finding new and creative ways to highlight their positions. And also they live by the guidelines that any piece of spandex that they can squeeze into... fits.
Except for the spandex, pretty much the same is true with this motley political crew, only the negotiation for sponsorship deals with moisturizers are replaced with negotiations for nuclear non proliferation. Other than that, eerie similarities.
So here it is, a list of the brightsides of enduring a presidential election campaign that greatly exceeds the general public’s ability to feign interest:
- Mike Huckabee could actually break the world record for non-stop cluelessness.
- Plenty of time left for Joe Biden to make up his mind whether he’s running or not. Or not.
- If Donald Trump hasn’t insulted your particular interest group yet, don’t worry, he’ll get around to you eventually.
- George Pataki could decide he needs to spend more time annoying his family.
- Every single day you can watch Bernie Sanders get crankier.
- Plenty of time for Rick Perry to extend his “hey, I’m really smart” make-over by growing an Albert Einstein haircut.
- Can count on at least 16 or 17 more Hillary email dumps before the first primary.
- Jeb Bush can finally perfect an answer to that nagging question, “What would you have done in Iraq?”
- John Kasich could arrange for a charisma implant.
- See Marco Rubio earn that touch of grey above the sideburns he so desperately desires.
- Gives Chris Christie plenty of time to exercise and adopt a sensible diet to get down to his fighting weight of 320.
- Ted Cruz can mount an entire season series of filibusters.
- Gives Scott Walker the opportunity to scrub his name off the Ashley Madison client list.
- More Benghazi hearings.
Will Durst is an award- winning, nationally acclaimed comic