Commentary: Thwarting the "nimrod bloc" -- and other sordid tales of politics.

(The following is the author's personal view and does not necessarily reflect the official editorial stance of NA Confidential -- which is fortunate, as we don't yet have one.)

The local blogosphere has been fairly quiet this week, perhaps reflecting the arrival of temperate weather and the many festive opportunities preceding Derby 132.

Elsewhere in cyberspace, a motley collection of predictably anonymous commentators has attempted to discern existential meaning from a primary election that reportedly drew less than 20% of registered voters to the polls, although it should be obvious that this scale of comprehensive public apathy ranks somewhat higher in significance than these typically labored efforts to selectively graft petty personal agendas onto miniscule vote totals.

To be sure, Maury Goldberg is making an earnest stab at interpreting the results over at New Albany Today, and his work is worth your attention.

Now that the obstructionist spitwad blogyard has grown silent since the belated introduction of adult standards of disclosure, we must look for our daily doses of pathos, futility and amusement to Freedom to Screech, where the decidedly non-academic poseur currently cross-dressing as “Erik/Erika” has triumphantly announced that some folks hereabouts “have alot to learn about New Albany Politics!”

I disagree.

As to the failures of certain longstanding political practitioners, no, there’s not much more to be learned than what already is visible to the naked, long-suffering eye.

The persistent dysfunction of “New Albany Politics” can be seen in its genetic propensity toward stunted comprehension of the modern world, an inbred inability to visualize, and a sometimes sentimental but periodically violent adoration for the palpably untrue.

Then again, it’s easy for me to say these things, as I’m neither a Democrat nor a Republican.

Rather, I belong to that little-known third group, among the ones who’d rather accomplish something of lasting value than waste time creating and abetting culture wars that defer attention from matters of genuine importance that stand to benefit the general populace.

There are many others in New Albany who feel the same way, and many – even most – of them openly declare a party allegiance. So be it. It is my fervent wish that these intelligent and well-meaning Democrats and Republicans not permit the dead, innuendo-driven weight of the looter factions in both their respective parties to pull them down into the traditional New Albany muck of illiteracy, malice and loathing.

After all, it’s the very same despair-ridden muck that we must resolve to escape if this city is to succeed in the necessary task of reinventing itself. Of course, my default inclination is to propose unity of purpose across the aisle as the best antidote to pernicious partisanship, which of course exposes me to immediate charges of naivete and idealism.

Guilty as charged. After all, skeptics as well as cynics are naïve idealists at heart.

I’m informed by high school dropouts with Messianic complexes that working, reading, writing, exercising, traveling and advocating the advantages of a life governed by the mind aren’t sufficient credentials for citizenship; rather, I must declare allegiance to one or the other political organizations, which together have governed the city of New Albany throughout the time of the city’s degradation.

I’m told by hooded character assassins that the obsolete language of local political dysfunction must be mastered prior to my penitent petition to shed the dilettante’s badge and assume my rightful place in local society.

Let’s be blunt: That’s complete and utter gibberish.

As you read these words, we are in socio-economic flux, and the language necessary to compete in this evolving world likewise is changing and will continue to change irrespective of our whim and desires.

Several dialects of this tongue already are being spoken out in the street, and this fact is well understood by a younger, more worldly and better educated local leadership cadres -- especially in the Democratic Party.

Just because I wish them well in their efforts to reform a creaking tar paper shack into a contemporary structure without ward heelers that leak, it doesn’t mean I desire a membership card – at least until the reactionary elements are purged.

I remain a pants-down independent.

For now.