Editorials

Political experts are everywhere these days

Highlands Today
Published: October 18, 2012

If you're on the social media sites Facebook or Twitter, you've likely been subjected to an onslaught of rabid political commentary about one presidential candidate or another by everyone you know — and a lot of people you don't know.

It's telling that whichever candidate one is supporting trounced the other one in the last presidential debate.

Romney fans are puffed up like toads after Tuesday's debate, and so are Obama supporters.

It's almost comical, actually, but it's also an insight into the lack of objectivity and preconceived notions.

No one doubts Romney won the first debate. Obama hardly showed up for that debate. Romney received a nice bump in the polls as a result, too.

But those numbers were starting to drop in the last few days, although he's still doing better than he was.

Obama likely will see a bit of a bump after this last debate, but probably not as much as Romney. Then again, just as many people will say Romney won and will pull away even further.

The truth of the matter is unless one of the candidates pulls away by, say, 10 points, it's anyone's guess.

Polls have margins of error and it seems like some polls have been off in recent elections.

Voters, though, see what they want when watching these debates.

If their candidate scores a point, they're convinced it's an old-fashioned whuppin'. If the other candidate gets in a good one, they cry foul or nastiness. If the moderator asks a question that slips up their candidate, it's media bias from the moderator.

Facebook pages filled up Tuesday evening with political arguments raging every which way.

There were just as many posts by people saying how sick they are of all the political rants. Well, the fact is, people have loved to argue politics since the beginning of, well, politics. It seems nastier this year than ever before, and that's too bad, but politics has always been a tough game.

Until Election Day, though, enjoy all the brilliant commentary supplied by family and friends. Or not.