The US election process for president hasn't changed much since 1955. Oh yes, the speed at which results are calculated, the process of using an electronic machine instead of a pencil to mark a vote, and the new varieties of ways that we can be "touched" by candidates, although remotely, has increased immensely. But the vast quantities of dollars spent on promotion, via television, radio, telephone, internet sites, email and print media, hasn't.
Take this quote from Franchise, a futuristic, science fiction short story written by Issac Asimov in 1955, about the 2008 election,
"Listen, I was around when they set up Multivac (the new computerized way to choose a president in the futuristic 2008). It would end partisan politics, they said. No more voters' money wasted on campaigns. No more grinning nobodies in high-pressured and advertising-campaigned into Congress or the White House. So what happens. More campaigning than ever, only now they do it blind."
In 1955, when the story was written, in Asimov's eyes there was a good deal of money being wasted on advertising and plenty of plastic-faced politicians trying to win votes. And maybe he saw the delegates move into more power and the disagreement of the true voters of their respresentation which may not have supported their view. Maybe he wanted to predict that with all the delegate disagreement that the almighty US government would have to capture that power by giving the vote for the president to just one voter, determined by unnamed attributes.
Franchise is an excellent story, and quite fun to see the date, November 4, 2008 in the pages of the story. found in ISAAC ASIMOV, The Complete Stories, Volume I.
No comments:
Post a Comment