Weve Only Just Begun (OPINION)

I recently went to visit my dad for Father’s Day.

Opinions, he has plenty.

As we often do, we talked about life, golf and our sentiments on the world happening around us.

As the conversation took its usual twists and turns, I came to this realization — it is not yet July of an election year, and I may be burned out on the election season.

The negative campaigning and election talk in general are taking a toll.

Apparently, all the Republicans are running against Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi. If you watch the television ads with a perceptive eye, you may pick up on that subtle theme.

Don’t like the Affordable Care Act? Just vote for That Candidate (R) as your next attorney general and he’ll stand up to the president and get that repealed.

Want your Second Amendment rights defended? Cast your ballot for This Candidate (R) to be Arkansas’ governor and he’ll protect your right.

Exactly how is anyone’s guess.

As for the Democrats, has there been a candidate presented who doesn’t talk only in canned sound bites and empty statements?

And this isn’t specific to any party, but it is maddening to hear a sound bite that declares, for example, “Paul Gatling voted to move jobs to China.”

Who would do that? A candidate may have voted for something that led to a certain company moving jobs overseas, but do candidates think voters are so easily duped as to believe an American elected official would take office thinking, “OK, now how can I get some U.S. jobs moved to Taiwan?”

As disheartening as all of this sounds, consider this: the majority of voters don’t make up their minds until the last couple of weeks of the campaign.

Politicians and their operatives have only just begun to persuade, distort, misrepresent, spew and embellish in order to secure your coveted vote.