More laughter needed in political squabbles

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Last weekend, I found myself in Tennessee with a few good friends, driving around admiring the neon lights and country music blaring from every street corner.

I happened to look out the window at a passing white SUV with a clever political bumper sticker. Usually I pass them off as fodder for the partisan wildfire, serving no purpose but to state one’s stance and possibly anger those who disagree. And I know that I’ve seen this one before, but something about this sticker seemed so hilarious.

Playing off President Barack Obama’s campaign slogans of change and hope, this cleverly changed the sticker to “Nope, keep the change.”

Sure, that’s been around for a while, but in light of the recent follies on Capitol Hill over things such as health care, the play on the president’s campaign slogan seemed to resonate with irony. I laughed and pointed the sticker out to my friends at the next stoplight. But I was one of the only ones who found the humor in this.

“That’s not funny!” one said, her tone scathing, as if I had spoken blasphemy. She looked at that sticker differently than I did, and found its message irritating.

Why not? I voted for Obama, and I thought that was hilarious.

“It just isn’t.”

Eventually, she agreed with the clever way the sticker used the patriotic “O” symbol inside the words, and how it almost looked just like a “Hope” bumper sticker, using similar fonts and colors.

I guess the cleverness of the sticker got to me first, then I thought about all the political bickering we see in the media and how — in reality — nothing has changed. Politicians still bicker over political differences and ideologies. The only change is the person in power, and it feels like our president has to act more like a schoolteacher than a leader, trying to get juvenile members of Congress to behave.

But then I started thinking about how differently we viewed the same satirical sticker. We both support Obama, but a small political joke like that bumper sticker got under her skin. It made me wonder: Are we so polarized in our political views that we can’t even laugh at our own political side?

I hope not. I mean, I’m as big of a supporter of Obama as the next Democrat, but come on, let’s laugh a little. Did we really expect that one senator from Illinois was going to waltz into the Oval Office, sit down, and the entire world would be rainbows and butterflies? That he’ll give a speech in front of Congress and every vote instantly will be in favor of his majestic words and policies?

Thinking like that is a joke. In reality, we’re always going to disagree. That’s just the nature of politics. Big issues take time, because they can affect our nation for a long time to come. It’s more important that we hold intelligent discussions about these issues instead of resorting to pathetic name calling and heckling. Maybe if we can laugh at ourselves, it’ll be easier to identify with one another.

And more importantly, let’s at least be willing to joke not only at someone else’s political favors, but our own. I should be able to find humor at the idea that Obama is going to confiscate every gun in the nation, as well as chuckle at the idea that our president won a Nobel Peace Prize, and then announced to send more troops to Afghanistan. It doesn’t mean I’m anti-Barack; I just try to see a little humor.

When former President George W. Bush was in office, I found a majority of his actions to be hilarious (I especially miss some of his hilarious quotes). I feel it is my obligation as an American citizen to laugh at the most powerful man in our country. Why should I treat Obama any differently just because I agree with him more than Bush?

We need a little bit of humor nowadays. The economy’s still down in the dumps, housing markets are a little depressed and things such as Haiti and Chile’s earthquakes always are a somber topic.

So let go of the little disagreements and try to laugh a little at our political system. I know it’s the only way I’m keeping my sanity.

Matt Mikus is a State News guest columnist and journalism senior. Reach him at mikusmat@msu.edu.

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