The Coen Brothers on the Upcoming Election

I just came out of the Coen Brothers new movie “Burn After Reading.” Disclaimer: I’m a fan. It got bad reviews, but I thought it was a hilarious illustration of how partially-educated, insanely self-confident people perceive issues and events. When people have a superficial understanding of the way things work, they make incredibly bad judgment calls. Very similar to “No Country for Old Men,” their last movie, in its themes, if not its mood.

I went into the movie having just commented on Robert Scoble’s post about politics. Scoble exhorted the Democrats to get back to being aspirational and talking about issues.

I have been trying to talk about the issues” on NewsGangLive all summer, or at least trying to, in the hopes of educating our microcommunity on the importance of having a smart person who can choose good advisors and make nuanced decisions as our next President, but Steve Gillmor keeps telling me people don’t vote on the issues and that it’s about character and values and context. And I dare say he is right. So we continue to point out how McCain lies, and how the media gives him a pass, and how we all should be angry.

I wish I weren’t so well-informed on the issues and could just take a pot shot at Sarah Palin, but like Robert, I too keep asking Obama to aspire to something: in my case, it’s rebuilding our national infrastructure, and I mean more than broadband, while encouraging alternative energy development.

Those are things he can actually DO things about. Health care costs are beyond him, except at the margins; the players are too entrenched. His best bet would be to create jobs that would allow people to AFFORD health insurance, however we decide to tweak the patient-payer-provider system. He can’t do too much about education, either, because most control is local. And on foreign policy, we have put ourselves so much on the defense during the last eight years that the next President will be responding, rather than leading.

The next President, and I hope it is Obama, has to pick one national BHAG that the President can actually have some impact on.

Because of our (fantastic) system of checks and balances, many things are beyond the next occupant of the Oval Office, no matter which party wins. So the only thing to do is build consensus between Congress and the Presidency again — which has been destroyed by Bush.

I’m an Independent, but I wouldn’t vote for McCain if they threatened me with death. Especially now that he has chosen Palin. I’m no dope. McCain can flip flop and shift to fit the political winds, but he is an old man with recurring melanoma, which is a very potentially deadly form of cancer, and I am terrified of the ignorance represented by Sarah Palin.

And here’s a potentially unpopular position, because it is ironic. I want someone who “earmarks” every dollar of the budget to attack the infrastructure and energy problems of America. There’s nothing wrong with earmarks if they actually do some good. We’re tangled in semantics, rather than actions.

Forgive the rant. The Coen Brothers are convinced that the public can’t understand these complex issues. Scoble is bummer. But I’m my usual Pollyanna self: we can fix this, if only we empower the right person to do it.