I’m “PC.” No, not politically correct if that’s what you’re thinking. Although I try to behave most often in a dignified manner, finding the opportunity to respect others (even annoying politicians who’ll do anything for a vote). I generally refrain from name-calling or insults. Behavior like that almost always comes right back to scorch the perpetrator. 

This “PC” refers to the abbreviation of my own relatively new political party. I am “PC,” otherwise known as a “positive cynic.” Members of the Positively Cynical Party (of whom there are nearly 250 million members, as of yet unregistered—in fact they never even heard of my party) get a kick out of monitoring the mores of their fellow humans. By doing so, we understand a lot more about life cycles, trends and the reasons things are the way they are. When it comes to politics in this, the land of the free and the brave, we notice consistent patterns that develop and stick like flypaper time after time, election after election. Now that we’re full tilt into the political season and the race for the presidency, allow me to spell out the problems in our system and what the “PC” Party would like to see done about them.

First, the campaign for the White House is too long. Ridiculously too long. When candidates are around as long as the islanders have been lost on “Lost,” we’ve got ourselves a problem. Between the Democrats and Republicans (the mainstreamers as my party refers to them) during this primary season alone, there have been over twenty televised debates. I dare you to remember highlights. Too many debates, caucuses, forums, ads, rallies, buttons, bumper stickers and barnstorming. It all makes for a very bored public and tired, cranky, punch-drunk candidates. The solution? Shorten the campaign season down to five weeks: Two in the spring, two in the summer, and one week between October 15th and election day (with zero campaigning allowed during the World Series).

Second, the fact is that one of three people – a woman, an African American or a senior citizen – is going to be elected president in 2008. While everyone is seemingly thrilled that for the first time in American history we have true diversity in the field, you can almost hear it now, the whining and moaning from the two inevitable losing camps. With only one taking the prize, there is bound to be a whole country full of irate females, dissed African Americans or crotchety oldsters complaining that the election process was rigged and just plain unfair. America the melting pot might just see its lid boil over. I guess we cannot help it, not with the human condition being what it is. Nobody likes to lose and with so much emphasis on demography, ethnicity, gender, age and race these days, look out sports fans. The coming fault lines could make the San Andreas look like a sidewalk crack. That would be a shame. Therefore, my party proposes that all candidates in the general election appear at their major debates nude. Nudity is the great equalizer, the only way we voters can get the, if you’ll excuse the expression, naked truth. Of course, it may spur Victoria Secret models to file their candidacy papers but I ask you, what would be so wrong with that? It would certainly add a bit of spice to a campaign and you’ll definitely see young males voting in larger numbers.

Third, with the campaign so dreadfully long, we end up finding out way too much about the candidates, with much of the juiciest sleaze leaked and fostered by the opposition. And the stuff we find out isn’t all that critical now is it? Salacious perhaps, but not always a determining factor in electing someone to be chief executive. Whether someone partook of the evil weed in college (that is if the dude actually inhaled) or got busted for driving without a license in a cornfield back in ‘64, isn’t nearly as important as the votes they have cast, their record of success in the private sector, or their overall character. Character should be based on their interactions with other and their history. The way someone treats his or her spouse and children matters to me. And if someone treats a dry cleaner, gardener, driver, security guard or secretary with respect and common decency, they’ve earned points on the character scale. 

Back to the matter of fixing our political system. My solution to the age-old problem of smear tactics and character assassination? We legislate a special date in the election cycle called “Confession Day,” in which each candidate by law must divulge any embarrassing thing he or she ever said, wrote, intimated, stole, smoked or… (fill in the blank). That way, each will diffuse an opponent’s ugly attacks and we can air all dirty laundry right off the bat, thus clearing the way for talk about issues. It will be o.k. merely a chance for a little contrition and gut spilling. Voters, with Catholics getting special dispensation since they do this regularly as a rule, will be welcome to join the candidates in confessional caucuses around the nation. Therapists will stand at the ready to assist making it quite an economic plus for the psychological profession.

There are many pressing matters, but I would finally like to suggest that we pass a Constitutional amendment banning the most obnoxious part of our long and tedious political campaigns--- The Buzzword   

One would have thought that by now, we Americans would have heard all manner of buzzwords and caught on to what they are truly about---absolutely nothing.  

Candidates are still promising hope, unity, a new spirit, a fresh start, that brighter future for our children, and of course the new champion buzzword of the modern era --- change. Check out the campaign rhetoric of John Adams or James Monroe and you’ll find them saying the very same things, albeit using better grammar. Change is something you get back when you slip the coffee clerk a fin these days (and not much change at that). Major change occurs gradually and is hardly noticeable in such a large, busy place like America.

Whenever I head to the elementary school gymnasium to vote, I don’t expect the heavens to part, or a savior to come forward who will carry us through troubled waters on his muscular back to greener pastures. Nope, I vote for the one who seems the least likely to fall to pieces if he loses; the candidate who takes a risk by actually admitting that the problems we face are tough, the solutions possibly tougher. I vote for the person who believes as I do that this country’s strength rests solely with its citizens. 

The bottom line is this. I’m a leading member, alright the only member, of the Positively Cynical Party. And while I’m happy to stick it to politicians who promise everything to everybody, while delivering the same cookie cutter speeches for months at a time, I’m still supremely positive, hopeful and proud of this country and its political system. Many more good people do run for office and serve in our government. We beat the heck out of them once they’re elected, holding our politicos to a far higher standard than we ourselves would ever want to bear. I remain cynical in a very healthy way, but I’m thoroughly convinced that this is the finest country and system as yet devised. Churchill said it best, “Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government, except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.”

Fidel Castro called it quits this week after 50 years of brutal, dictatorial rule in Cuba. I doubt I’d have the chance to ever be a cynic there. God Bless America.