{"id":135139,"date":"2014-12-19T09:31:25","date_gmt":"2014-12-19T04:01:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=135139"},"modified":"2014-12-24T00:04:52","modified_gmt":"2014-12-23T18:34:52","slug":"the-floating-voter-weighs-options","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/the-floating-voter-weighs-options\/","title":{"rendered":"The Floating Voter Weighs Options"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Malinda Seneviratne<\/span><\/a> –<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Malinda<\/a>

Malinda Seneviratne<\/p><\/div>\n

Meanwhile in a parallel universe<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

In all elections people talk of the floating vote. The undecided. Those who may be swayed one way or another. In some elections the floating vote can decide an election. Naturally, come election time all kinds of theories are floated about the floating vote. Some say it has expanded and some say it has contracted. Some say \u2018won\u2019t count this time\u2019 too. No one seems to have succeeded in putting a finger on the floating vote. But in a parallel universe, the floating voter has a voice. Let us listen.<\/p>\n

I am an intangible. I am talked of as though I am someone\u2019s playing. A commodity. A bargain. No one wants to listen to me. No one wants to acknowledge that I have grievances too. In fact I have aspirations as well.<\/p>\n

Right now I am in a bit of a quandary. Things are moving back and forth at such a speed that it is hard to figure out whether someone else is moving, whether I am being jostled this way and that by the traffic or if I am standing still while the political world does its usual election-time somersaults.<\/p>\n

I am supposed to be sitting on the fence. I am supposed to be right there in the middle. Neither here nor there. I am supposed to be up for grabs. My problem is that the fence is not staying in one place. If this side is identified by who is located there and that side by who is on the other side, it\u2019s gotten really confusing of late. Here today, gone tomorrow: that\u2019s how things have been the past few days. \u2018I won\u2019t budge,\u2019 someone says and the next moment he\u2019s jumped and keeping jumping up and down in glee with his new found friends jumping with him too. Makes me dizzy to watch these things.<\/p>\n

And then there\u2019s the line. Forget politicians and who-what they may represent. There\u2019s also track record. Then there\u2019s the package, promises that is. I\u2019ve been looking this way and that and I am totally confused. I can\u2019t believe that some people can stand with some other people, considering what they\u2019ve said about one another. I can\u2019t believe the promises made when there\u2019s the past is littered with broken pledges, mandates re-interpreted for personal benefit and manifestos turned into toilet paper.<\/p>\n

The one good thing about being a floating voter is the \u2018floating\u2019 part of it. Our people can fly. We can rise above the gooey stuff that is made of periodically auctioning off non-existent resources, promising the undeliverable and solemn-faced acknowledgment of error and begging forgiveness for crimes of omission and commission. From up here I can see a bunch of nitwits bickering at each other. From up here I can see there\u2019s blue and green on one side and blue and green on the other side too. From up here I can see rogues and sycophants on both sides of the shifting, vaguely-demarcated political divide.<\/p>\n

From up here I ask myself, \u2018do either of these jokers deserve my vote?\u2019 From up here I can see that one of the biggest lies in these situations is the claim \u2018lesser evil\u2019 for EVIL is a word embossed on the membership card one gets the moment one assumes that despicable identity \u2018politician\u2019.<\/p>\n

I concur with my brother who said \u2018I\u2019m fed up of seeing the same bullshit over and over being quoted, re-quoted, edited, re-edited, mixed, re-mixed, compared, contrasted and conflated until none of it makes any sense at all.\u2019<\/p>\n

So here\u2019s to you Mrs Robinson: \u2018anyway you look at it you lose\u2019.<\/p>\n

Going to sleep.\u00a0\u00a0 Wake me up sometime in late January 2015, ok?<\/p>\n

*Malinda Seneviratne is the Chief Editor of \u2018The Nation\u2019 and his articles can be found at www.malindawords.blogspot.com<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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