[Kätzchen]

I am so appreciative of the commentary that members here make about issues arising from the Democratic and Republican campaigns for US presidency. I especially appreciate Bulldog and Martina’s perspective and often find myself utilizing the way they filter the political process via their own unique system of filtering the latest and ongoing political events.

I came across Martina’s post in another forum thread on the 2012 election. Martina found three articles and of those three, the article published in The New Yorker – “Transaction Man: Mormonism, private equity, and the making of a candidate” – was very interesting read in that author, Nicholas Lemann, epitomized Mormon culture to a T. Lemann’s October 1st literary pièce de résistance was framed as a 4-part orchestral arrangement to the tune of: Church, Business, Politics, and The Rescuer (Link to article found, here)


As I read that article, I sat nodding my head in agreement with most of thematic tone and intent conveyed throughout the entire essay. When I got to the three final paragraphs, which describe in MBA lexicon how Romnean synaptic cells seem to not bond with the pubic in cerebral ways, the first thing I thought of was this: What is missing from this essay? Why did Lemann end his article with the synaptic allegory? Was he hoping to facilitate a synaptic hookup for Romney? And, at least 20 more questions came to mind that I cannot even give public utterance to except, do any of you remember that The New Yorker in the 2008 election coverage pressed political hot-buttons with their brand of satire (the front cover image of Obama dressed as a Muslim)??? Yeah, I doubt if they pull a stunt like that again, in light of what happened recently that cost a US ambassador his life and the lives of those caught in the cross-fire of the latest political upheaval in the Middle East.

This election is even more personal for me than the last one was. I grew up in a rural community where, at the time, Mormons comprised at least 90% of the population. The other 10% were comprised of German, Dutch, English and a small sampling of Irish and Scottish based households. The single most relative connection shared among all households was the idea that most familial structures were patrilineal by design; however, my family seemed to be the statistical troublemaker in that my mother’s lineage was of matrilineal design which often competed against the patrilineal structure internally as well as externally – a ‘Molotav cocktail’ (conflict of authority), as seen rather frequently in our household. Although my family was not Mormon, the school district that serviced my rural community was heavily proselytized by Mormons, so I totally get the socio-political cultural piece of Mormonism and what it means in terms of deep political connections to small and big business across the American landscape.

Since the first debate (and there’s one tonight, yes?) and ongoing press coverage of the presidential race, I find myself holding my breath and fine tuning my own filters by calling upon my large cache of life experience and academic achievements. One thing seems for certain, in the sea of political uncertainty over the past few weeks: There is a lot at stake in this presidential election. I appreciate the tremendous investment of time and energy Obama expends not only in his presidential campaign, but also in his brand of leadership.