I've Skimmed Some Articles And I'm Ready To Explain The Election
It’s a confusing time in American politics. Even by our nation’s standards, this is a chaotic election season, with Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton making bold claims and stoking fervor in their supporters. With all these voices dominating the political discussion, it’s hard to make sense of the news sometimes. Luckily, I’m here to help.
I’ve skimmed some articles and I’m ready to explain the election.
I was once like you: confused, overwhelmed and unsure of where to find information and what sources I can trust. But after taking a cursory glance at some articles from seemingly trustworthy sources, I've cobbled together a comprehensive opinion on the candidates for the 2016 election.
For example, let’s talk about Democratic(?) candidate Hillary Clinton. As the first female presidential nominee, she’s a feminist icon who’s paving the way for women everywhere, but she’s also a racist war criminal, I think? She definitely did something problematic; not totally sure what the deal is there. Something about emails, maybe?
I know that’s a lot of information to take in at once, but you don’t reach this level of astute political understanding overnight. You have to skim a lot of think pieces, read a lot of opening paragraphs, and then make a lot of assumptions based on the few sentences you’ve already read to gain a semi-clear picture of what maybe could be happening in this election.
I didn’t gain this kind of political know-how just by skimming articles, of course. Sometimes I’ll read a headline and jump to conclusions based on recognizable buzzwords. Sometimes I’ll read a strongly worded political tweet from a pundit-type dude and regurgitate it in casual conversation, despite the complete lack of context. Last week I heard Wolf Blitzer say something about superdelegates on CNN while I was at the doctor’s office and now I bring up superdelegates at literally every possible opportunity.
If you’re still confused, let me break down Republican nominee Donald Trump for you: Oh brother, this guy is something else! It seems like every day he says something that is bad and makes people angry! What exactly has he been saying? I’m not sure, but I think I saw a Huffington Post headline that called him racist so I’m sticking with that! Again, I can only deliver this kind of B- political analysis because I’ve dedicated my life to understanding a vague approximation of current events.
So even if you're hopelessly confused by this election, take comfort in knowing that anyone can skim an article. And the sooner you start skimming articles, the sooner you can impress people who don't read at all.
