No Excitement for 2016 Elections

November 2016 is a long way away, and several candidates have formally entered the fray. With such notables as Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, and Rand Paul testing the waters for the GOP and each offering what on paper seem substantial differences with the anointed Hillary Clinton of the Democrats the prospects for next year should be appealing. But the fact is that it's getting a lot harder to become excited about elections, and that's considering there are things which at one time would have made excitement easy.

Take for example Dr. Ben Carson. It's pretty obvious that many conservative media and social organs like him, and no doubt that he might well be a good right winger. He's surely outside of the Washington loop, which is supposed to make him all the more appealing. Yet it's quite easy to say the right things to an audience which you're trying to cater to. But can you actually translate that into good use of real power?

That's a very difficult thing to do. Outside of the political structure one can say whatever they want. Inside the structure, when there are hundreds of elected officials many of whom are working at cross purposes to you, and millions more bureaucrats who can effectively stymie your efforts, well, how effective can you be?

This is not to let politicians off the hook. When you pledge something you must do your best to make it work. Yet all too often the invariable compromises move you father away from your mark. And that's before the courts allow their various opinions of the non-elected to block your way too. It makes one wonder whether, as many libertarians assert, voting is worth it.

It is, but only because the alternative of long range tyranny is far worse. Sadly, that assertion really doesn't inspire the citizenry very much. That's no doubt in part because of the force everything to the middle thrust which defines American politics. Why get excited when you know the end result will most likely satisfy no one?