opportunity knocks

As someone who considers herself a fairly informed individual, especially in comparison to some of my university peers, I of course watched Friday evening's presidential debates. I saw the eye rolling, the name calling, and the "Truth Squad" from NBC point out the factual errors of each candidate in the post-game analysis. (Eisenhower did not write a letter of resignation. Take that.) And I agreed with most of the commentators: the candidates did a good job of reassuring their respective camps of their policies, but really didn't say anything new. Sure, they breezed over the specifics of the financial bail out, but who wouldn't? No one wants to hear that because investment banks are tanking their kid's school is going to even further cut the music program. It's the way political jargon is expected to run.

And then, when I was standing outside Martin Stadium in Pullman yesterday, I found myself standing about 4 feet away from Dino Rossi, as he was kissing the usual ass of Eastern Washington. And a thought came to me:

What would I say if I walked up to him and asked one question?

Think about it. We complain about biased coverage all day long (shout out to Chris Matthews), but if given the chance, what would we want to directly ask of a political candidate?

My first thought was broad, more along the lines of "hi, my name is Joy Bacon. Why should I vote for you?" In Dino Rossi's case, I want to ask him if he ever learned about fallacies in high school AP language arts, because if he had, he would know that you can't prove a causal link between Christine Gregoire and food prices in a 30-second TV spot. And then all the other questions that flood my mind surrounding social policy end up pinning me as a one-issue voter, which I hope to God to never be. And even now, as I sit in my office and try to come up with some intellectual, world-changing question, I can't decide.

I guess what it comes down to is that I'm tired of scripted answers. I'm fed up with ads that I don't trust or speeches you don't need corrective eye wear to see through. I want a straight yes or no, a simple explanation, or a simple "I don't know, but I'll get back to you." Now all I have to do is find the perfect question to get me that answer.