–Michele:

The tip off on these sorts of letters, for me, is that they use so much  all-capital-letters (=shouting on the internet).  Here are the facts about that chain letter as covered by an objective third party:

http://www.factcheck.org/2009/12/electronic-medical-records-for-congress/

To me, this  sort of email is poison — it  may help us vent our frustration, but does ut  really help us take one step closer to ‘taking back our country’? No. For since these kinds of  emails are fueled by feeling and not by reason they hinder more than they help.

And then I have a question for the author of this email: Taking back our country from whom? The ‘other party’, a black President? Who took it and how did that happen? Just too much muddled thinking going on there for my taste.

As for the idea driving this email, that of dumping all incumbents and starting over, I think that may be emotionally satisfying right now but seems a bit simplistic, unrealistic and downright dangerous to me: This is a large country, extremely complex, with so many government and intertwined social systems  in place which, if changed for the sake of change, could bring us to chaos. But let me explain my way of looking at all the verbiage which passes for communication about the the state of the Union:

A look at just about any public web discussion (even on sites like Reuters, NYTimes etc) shows me that the public is way too ignorant of how things work(myself included in many areas); People believe what they hear in their particular echo chamber (Fox/ MSNBC for example) so language is loaded with partisan buzzwords and therefore muddled, no consensus on definition of terms or even factual history are shared across idealogical divides; it’s sort of a Mars-Venus thing. What we need is a sort of Political Esperanto which uses terms with agreed upon meanings, not talking points or scripts as handed down from ‘the Party’ (Left or RIght).

Also, if one looks at the flow of ‘talk’ around all this, it seems to me that  the principles of distortion and semantic manipulation found in classic mass propaganda characterize many things said in so called ‘forums’. All venting, no problem-solving.

I study these forums for the content of what is said as well as for the communication processes at work in how things are said:
So, in addition to –  at best — fuzzy content which is often grossly exaggerated, slanted, loaded with ad hominem or generalizations about those who think differently — the style (the ‘how’ of communication) is entirely  too much shouting and not enough thoughtful listening or shared problem solving across philosophical differences.

It is this total breakdown in civil political discourse which worries me more than anything about the present political climate. If this trend of voting (and discussing policy) out of anger in lieu of rational (dare I hope for ‘respectful’?) critical thinking continues, I fear civil war is even possible. George Washington (and John Adams) said that political parties will be the ruination of this country. And this was in the1780′s! Let’s hope they were being cautionary and not prophetic.

Imagine if we just replaced all incumbents with just anyone (like a bunch of Rand Pauls, or Christine O’Donnells or my neighbor Al who is fed up and wants to run for office — he sells insurance) chances that we’ll get someone less competent at managing a huge complex country seem pretty high to me.  New does not mean better. Given the current anti-gov’t sentiment(albeit deserved), they might just do what they say they want to do:

1. Shut down Social Security (BTW, G.W. Bush argued in favor of this as a Yale student).
2. Close the Dept. of Education (and any other ‘cultural’ gov’t agency).
3. Close the EPA and all regulators of industry.
4. Make Abortion a crime.
5. Make homosexuality a crime.
6. Make Christianity the religion of the state.
7. Reverse the healthcare bills.
8. Revert to States Rights (ie, return to institutionalized discrimination).
and more….

And they would do all this while verbalizing the need to honor the constitution. Cognitive dissonance at a grand scale I’d say…

But that’s just my 25cents worth. Feel free to share.