MikeyOpp.com

What a year it has been! I have never in my life witnessed such intensity and focus by both the American media and populace alike in the realm of American sport! I mean, as a nation, we’ve scarcely breathed as we’ve carefully watched a field of twenty plus contenders battle it down to a “final three,” with one team having already clinched the highly coveted red division pennant, and two teams still battling it out to win the equally coveted blue division title! And to think that we are finally only six months away from the ultimate showdown, scheduled for the second Tuesday in November!

I am, of course, talking about the most worthless sport in America: the race for President of the United States of America. What a joke! I can’t believe how celebrity crazed we, as a nation, have become! Lately, I wonder if we are attempting to elect a president, or simply trying to hold a popularity contest in which one man or woman will win based on their ability to best fake a persona that stands for absolutely nothing but rhetoric and false charm. Does anyone really care anymore about who will win the highly coveted ‘crown’ that is the title of 44th President of the United States of America, given the fact that all three of the final contenders have proven themselves to be shallow, manipulative figureheads? And when did we allow ourselves, and our media, to turn our politicians into celebrities?

Does anyone actually believe, at this point, that any of these plastic statues actually represent anything “real” anymore? I know what you’re thinking: “But Mike, you crazy, hypocritical egomaniacal blathering moron, you just wrote a column about two months ago in which you wholeheartedly endorsed Senator Obama for President! What is wrong with you?”

I’ll tell you what is wrong with me; I’m actually willing to be flexible, and admit to myself that after months of watching several teams of carefully trained political trainers attempt to polish three turds, what lies beneath these carefully ascribed layers of polish is nothing more than a giant, festering, load of S-H-I-T.

Did anyone bother to watch the latest Democratic Debate (I believe it was the fourteen-millionth such debate since June of 2008)? I didn’t. But I did the next best thing; I read a transcript of the debate, and then I also read several right wing, left wing, and off-the-wing editorials of the event, and my synopsis is that all three frontrunners have completely flown off the handle, and lost sight of the entire point in running for President.

I thought that the point of being President was to successfully unify and lead the nation, to strengthen the populace’s trust in their elected officials, to speak the truth as one sees it, and above and beyond all else, to do the best to inspire people to act as the best versions of themselves that they are capable of.

But I don’t hold McCain, Clinton, or Obama solely responsible for the tragic demise of the charade that is running for public office. No, I place most of the blame on the media, and its repeated efforts to first lionize these men and women, and then to tear them down from the very pedestals that they have created. And I think this charade began many decades ago, with the 1960 election of “Camelot’s” own John F. Kennedy.

Only in America can we worship celebrities for acting in a manner that we perceive as “shameless,” and yet simultaneously turn our politicians into celebrities and then hypocritically berate and belittle them for their imperfections.

Who, after all, is perfect? Who, really, is even close to perfect? How is the “perfect” American supposed to look and act? Based on the media’s coverage, and the three aforementioned candidates for President’s speeches and actions, I would argue that Americans are convinced that their President must be some sort of perfectly mixed cake that somehow defies all the basic, scientific laws of human nature.

When I see the talking heads denouncing Obama for his “elitist remarks” and scolding Hillary for her inability to throw in the towel, and ridiculing McCain for his lack of youth and charisma, all I can do is think that the media expects the next president of America to be some sort of drab android that is so clean and inoffensive that they don’t even have to use a bathroom, because their system has no need to process bodily fluids and waste.

Hillary wants us to think that she doesn’t sleep, and instead stays awake next to a red phone, so that she can handle any emergency our nation faces.

Obama thinks that he is Dorothy, from the wizard of Oz, and that if he claps his carefully manicured hands three times while repeating the word “change”, everything will somehow get magically better.

And McCain, well, McCain thinks that if he keeps telling everyone that he was once a Prisoner of War, he’s entitled to the Presidency, based on his sacrifice alone.

I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad, unfriendly news (yet again), but I’m willing to bet my life on the fact that all three of these fine men and women regularly use the bathroom. In fact, they probably have some awkward moments in which their entire staff can smell their waste on the lengthy plane flight to their next stop in America, where all three are busy neglecting their sworn job to represent their states as a Senator, so that they can continue to beg and plead Americans for more money so that they can go to more states to beg for more money so that they can afford to go to even more states to beg for more money so that they can afford to convince the populace that they have “earned” our support, and therein, our votes.

What happened to the good old days, when candidates for public office were invited to actually speak their mind, to let the voters know how they really thought, and then they were expected to act according to their true personalities, upon their successful election?

When Theodore Roosevelt was elected President, he was expected to be a loud mouthed, arrogant, progressive leader. And he was. He spoke softly, but he also carried a giant freaking stick. And even though he threw tantrums when he didn’t get his way, he used this imperfection to secure for America one of the most lucrative and important international feats in our recorded history; the Panama Canal.

Harry S. Truman, the second to last honest President, supposedly had a placard on his desk that said “The buck stops here.” And it did. He never once apologized for nor tried to blame someone else for making what he considered to be “the hardest decision of his life,” to give the green light to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, because he felt, given the circumstances and information at the time, “it was the best possible solution.” Hillary still tries to blame others for approving the War in Iraq.

Dwight D. Eisenhower, of notable “I like Ike” fame [side note: If you insert an M before the last word in his slogan, I would argue that it’s just about the best slogan ever created] warned America, before exiting office, of the dangers of committing itself to “An Industrial Military Complex.” And it took about five years for his words to come true.

For when John F. Kennedy, the first in a long line of appallingly dishonest, appeasement crazy Presidents who care more about being popular than doing the right thing initiated the Vietnam War, he also created what has become America’s enduring obsession with perpetually waging war in order to boost the economy via government jobs created by the mammoth war machine.

Doing the right thing, when using your best judgment, is just about the only thing you can do in this lifetime that even if it turns out badly, was still the best thing to do. It’s one heck of a way to combat the syndrome that affects so many of us who knowingly do not do the right thing; and this is the agony of enduring the penalties that your nagging conscience will create for you when you act thusly. Yes, I just wrote thusly.

I have suffered from insomnia for nearly all my life. It began at around the same age that I became self aware, and began to understand the actual, incredibly obvious and inherent differences between good and bad actions. And recently, my insomnia has evaporated.

I have changed one major thing in my life, in order to cure my seemingly incurable insomnia. Since the New Year, I have sought, in every given moment, to act with the best judgment possible, and to therein behave as responsibly as possible in regards to not only my fellow man, but also IN REGARD TO MYSELF.

I capitalized that last part because it’s the part that I was ignoring since the onset of my insomnia. Ask most anyone who knows me, and they’ll say that I’m a nice guy, and that I don’t go out of my way to hurt others. And I’m proud of this reputation.

But what I have learned recently, is that this wasn’t enough, because while I was busy making sure that I wasn’t “even hurting a fly,” I was constantly acting in negative ways towards myself, and my own life, and this was the root cause of my most bitter, disappointing self-reflective moments in my life. This was the root of my insomnia.

Now, I know what you’re thinking; “Oh Mike, you arrogant bastard, get the hell off your high horse and stop telling others how to act. I know the difference between right and wrong, and I sleep just fine. (Oh, and while you’re at it, stop thinking that you know what other people are thinking, it’s called projection, and it’s judgmental and unfair!)”

You may be right. Hell, I sincerely hope you are right. But I’m also not a total idiot (just a moron)**, and I can empathize and see misery and pain in others, a lot of the time, and the older I get, the more I see it in many of the people around me, the people on TV, and the more I see it in myself.

So I wanted to take this opportunity to put myself “out there”, and to let everyone who chances to read this to know that there is a cure to your guilty conscience, and that cure begins to work when you stop attempting to emulate the media’s tainted version of perfection that is being shoved down your throat in advertising, television shows, radio, sports broadcasting, and public office elections. If you want to be happy, you have to stop paying attention to pretty much any image of perfection that is being produced by our media, and sold to you for a profit. [Side Note: This column is 100% FREE.]

You don’t have to be thin to be attractive to others. You don’t have to have sex with nine million different partners to be considered cool by your peers. You don’t even have to win more often than you lose in order to prove to yourself or anyone else that you are better than average; because you don’t have to compare yourself to others, you just have to accept who you are, and be the best you can be.

I know, I know, I sound like a Disney movie. But there IS a reason that we like our children to watch films that instill them with morals such as acceptance, forgiveness, and choosing happiness over material status.

All you have to do to be happy is be honest with yourself, make a list of the things that are actually bothering you, as opposed to the things that you have mistakenly been convinced to believe are bothering you, and then begin fixing them.

Imagine a world in which the media projected, advertised, and sold concepts such as positive reinforcement, patient, well thought out decision-making processes, and the importance of altruism and honesty.

Oh you can’t? Me neither. I think it’s because the media is incapable of selling the most crucial ingredient to happiness: Imagination. For if you can’t imagine and focus on achieving the true goals that your own heart and conscience desires to achieve, then you will replace these visions with visions brought to you by corporate sponsors and our media.

So I feel a tad bit bad writing this, but if you really want to be happy, then you are going to have to do a little self-reflective work, and you are going to have to discover your own imagination on your own. For imagination, unfortunately, cannot be produced, bottled, nor sold. Yup, you are truly on your own on this one, and I mean that in many more ways than one.