As fully expected, Barack Obama will serve a second term as President of the United States of America. Blame me, if you want to — I voted for him.

My good wife was abhorred that I had previously stated in this space I would not vote in the Presidential Election, and she was right to have been so vehement. My excuse, vapid as it was, was simply that I strongly felt even a positive vote would be considered recognition of an inept, ludicrous and preposterous opposition team.

Of course, once inside the polling booth, I suffered immediate misgivings. How could I legitimately ignore my franchise as an American and not vote for the superior candidate? Simply, I could not. Too much had been expended by too many to ignore the opportunity; it would have been foolhardy, ungrateful and unpatriotic.

And besides, what if my man lost because some idiot had not made a mark beside his name? Not possible, you say? Well, do some research.

In 1822, Simon Wetherspoon, in Monroe County, NY, was defeated for Animal Control Deputy by Gladys Lorraine Perkins — by only two votes, one of which would have resulted in a tie and a run - off election!

To my wife’s credit, she never once said, “See?” She did not have to.

I am, as always, a student of history. Or better still, of Yogi Berra.

Maybe politics, when treated as a diversion, is not all bad compared to “it aint over till it’s over”. Politics is nowhere near as good as baseball, but it is sure better than indulging one’s vices as a means of vicarious living and a way to vent.

Reminds me what Yogi said about peewee ball: “Little League baseball is a very good thing because it keeps parents off the streets.”

After the election was decided on November 6, the country was back on the streets, adjusting to the outcome, dealing with the post - campaign blues that, in a presidential year, reminded you of the baseball void that drops on us like a dusty shroud once the World Series ends. (This phenomenon is only slightly made easier if your team wins.)

If it is true that “the future aint what it used to be,” maybe it is
because politics has not paid enough attention to Yogi Berra. If we had, would we have elected Jimmy Carter?

According to Mark Russell, Carter was “a peanut farmer and a nuclear physicist from Georgia” and he had “teeth like Chiclets”.

Politics is a game where candidates avoid answering a direct question and instead spend a lot time declaring, “I never said most of the things I said,” and “half the lies they tell about me are not true”. Voters might find new interest in the game if a politician ever had it in his heart to say, “I wish I had an answer to that because I am tired of answering that question.”

It is like Anhasuer - Bush and Stoli vodka boycotting Denzel Washington’s movie FLIGHT because in it he portrays an alcoholic pilot.

No question, we should pay more attention to Yogi Berra.

Now, of course, that the country has spoken, I will support the victor even more. He is my president and I am an American. He will find out and be maligned again with what can be accomplished when burdened with a Congress that is even half alien.





Copyright©2012 by Robert A. Mills, all rights reserved