ADDD: Attention Deficit Disorder Democracy

Remember the movie “Memento”, about the guy who couldn’t remember recent things because his short term memory was damaged? Er…what was I saying?

That brilliant film now seems to be an unintentional but fitting allegory for American voters and our democracy. Here’s a proposed synopsis for a sequel “Memento 2 “:

The American Voter awakens in the morning. It’s June 2010. The economy is hobbled, corporations dominate democracy and our government, Wall Street corporations are making record profits while unemployment and foreclosures are at record highs, oil gushes uncontrollably from a well in the Gulf, insecurity and anger are rampant across the country.

The American Voter suffers from short term memory loss, has no idea where  he is or why. “Wow, things are really bad, anyone can see that. How did this happen? Who’s responsible for this? If only I could remember! Wait, that doesn’t matter! Whoever’s in charge now is responsible since it’s happening today! Yes! ”

Swiftly, before this thought is knocked out of the head of The American Voter by news about Lindsey Lohan’s marrying a giant promotional bottle of Hornitos tequila,  they switch on the tv. Cable News is playing and the Talking Heads explain that the current President is a man named Obama who, with his fellow Democrats, have not solved all of these problems.

“Bastards! It’s all their fault! They need to pay a price for things being the way they are! We need someone else in power who wouldn’t get us into this situation! Hmm…Re-pub-licans? They’re saying all the right things, everything I want to hear! I may not be able to remember who got us into Iraq and Afghanistan, who freed financial and oil corporations from regulations and thus allowed them to destroy our nation’s economy and oceans but I do love me some retribution! I’m voting you Dems out of office!  That’ll teach you!”

I hear Lipton is interested in marketing Memento 2 with promotional tea bags.

Really, how can Americans be so damn clueless? “Bush who? Republicans were in control of Congress before? Did they lower the deficit then, solve the Health Care crisis, make our economy better and make life better for Americans just as they promise to do now? Huh? Sure I’ll pull your finger, why not?!”

If you’ll excuse me mixing my allegories on an empty stomach, another one came to mind. This situation is like impatiently watching firemen trying to put out a forest fire started by arsonists, they don’t succeed as quickly as desired so they are the ones blamed for the fire, they are fired from their jobs and the arsonists are instead put in charge of stopping the fire they started.

Instead of short term memory loss being a physiological thing for far too many Americans, maybe they’re just political pot heads. They get high on their politics, eat crappy food that makes them obese and lazy and lose their short term memory of why they voted for Obama and which party put this country in a position where it needs to be rescued.

From now on, whenever I hear someone railing against Obama and the Dems for not quickly fixing all of the destruction of our country we’re suffering through that the Repubs and Bush caused and want to express their dissatisfaction by putting matches and gasoline back in the hands of these arsonists, all I can say is, “Are you high?”