New Mexico, Where Scotusocracy Rules

October 05, 2014

Voices, Politics / Current Events

I love our new Scotusocracy here in beloved New Mexico, though it looks an awful lot like the political system in some other countries, if you ask me.

Bigtime experts say, democracy works thisaway: Two candidates with different views put their cases to the voters to decide which candidate seems best qualified. The voter is the decider, and this causes citizens to have lots of problems trying to choose which of the two to vote for. There are debates and two campaigns, and stuff like that, and it’s all just so very confusing and demanding. Thank God now we have a better way thanks to the Soopreme Court.

While other names may appear on the pseudoballot during these fantastic, new fake elections, only one candidate can in actuality appeal to the voters. Get it? It's kind of like a joke. There’s only one message, and that’s the message of the Ubercandidate, but we pretend that other folks have a share of the airwaves, so to speak.

In our new US Scotusocracy there is really only one candidate just like Hong Kong or China or Russia or other great, enlightened places that have developed deep democratic traditions.  It’s ever so much simpler than a damn democracy, don’t you think?  And the voters don’t have to do nearly as much work. We like that in America—ease and convenience of use.

In the good old USA where we have a proud democratic tradition, we love the dollar, doncha know? The dollar is the most important godlike presence that enspirits the new Scotusocracy, because you see, we believe in this here America that corporations are people. Money talks. Bullshit walks.

Here in darling New Mexico during our recent gubernatorial campaign we are having the great honor of witnessing our first Scotucratic election, and the results are causing me a heightened sense of elation because elections have gotten so much simpler for us stupid and lazy voters.  Now the candidate who can flood the campaign with endless dollars, controls everything.  Naturally, that’s the one to vote for, since you have no idea what the other candidate thinks or does. It’s beautifully irrelevant.

This wonderful new way of holding elections is not like having a megaphone in a crowded room, as some have suggested. Such a campaign is more akin to having a million watt amplifier, floor speakers, a microphone and an ever-repeating message to scream into that crowded room. Even if you are one of the folks in the crowd and you yell as loud as you can, you can’t be heard. If you are Gary King, you speak softly anyway, so there’s no way a Gary King can be heard.

During the campaign for the state’s most important office, all we have seen is Queen of Hearts UberSusana’s delightful mug plastered everywhere, her face on the TV news crouching with various elementary school classes, her face in dozens of ads, her signs.  Anwhere and everywhere money can buy her presence, UberSusana has injected her sentimental appeal. 

She has never had to go through the nasty business of defending her record. She hasn’t had to answer any tough questions or face off with Gary. That’s a darn good thing too, because if she had to do all these unpleasant things, we might have to think, and thinking just gives you a headache. Things are ever so much simpler if you have a pretend democracy, where us poor, beleaguered voters can just listen to one voice instead of all this competing political babble.

Meanwhile Gary has taken his $15.15 campaign budget, bought himself a fifteen buck rocking chair that he can use to sit somewhere out on the malpais during the final days of the campaign where he can talk softly in a science type reasoning way with the horny toads and the rattlers. The fifteen cents that remains of Gary’s campaign budget can go for a glass of ice water to slake Gary’s eternal thirst. It takes a lot to talk til your blue in the face and get absolutely nowhere.




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James Burbank

James Burbank has written and published over 200 articles for regional and national publications such as Reuters International News Service, The World & I Magazine, National Catholic Reporter, Farmer’s Almanac, Los Angeles Herald Examiner, La Opinion, New Mexico Magazine, Albuquerque Journal, Albuquerque Tribune. He is author of Retirement New Mexico, the best selling book published by New Mexico Magazine Press, now in its third edition. He is also author of Vanishing Lobo: the Mexican Wolf in the Southwest, published by Johnson Books.

As a professional writing consultant, he has written and edited publications, video and radio scripts, annual reports, and investment information for a wide variety of corporate clients. A Lecturer II for the Department of English, Burbank has specialized in teaching technical writing and professional writing. His interests extend from composition and writing theory to environmental and nature writing. He has played a leadership role in developing and implementing the English Department’s teaching mentorship program.


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