Sigh. On the American election

Despite my efforts to ignore the American presidential campaign, I cannot avoid it. Having, and then having to defend, an opinion where I have no say and no influence is a rather pointless exercise. But others have very strong opinions indeed about this candidate or that one, and they find my position (they're both awful, I am glad not to be stuck making that choice, and I am praying for America) intolerable. Can I not see that their preferred candidate is better? Can I not see that the other is worse?

I think of the seventies and eighties, where every week there was some show or new prediction about how the world would end in nuclear fire. Some said the combined nuclear arsenals of the world could destroy the earth five times over. Some said it could destroy the earth six times over. And sometimes they would argue over the precise number: was it five, or was it six?

The debate was, I suppose, important: one should be precise about such things. But at heart it didn't really matter. The arsenals only had to destroy the earth once for the earth to be destroyed. After that, the extra was irrelevant. The difference between the two is a difference that is no difference.

That is my opinion of this campaign. It may be true that one candidate may be worse than the other, but the level of bad represented by both candidates is so great, it renders the difference irrelevant. All I hear in these arguments is that some prefers their candidate because that candidate will only destroy the country five times over, whereas the other will destroy it six times. A difference that is no difference.. One way or the other, disaster looms. Choosing one over the other is simply attempting to avoid Scylla by sailing into Charybdis.

I shall now resume my efforts to ignore the political campaign.