Column by Tim Riley

People love to hate things. One can see this clearly throughout life. There are always the big three that people despise based on: race, creed and color; However, there are so many other more trivial things to immensely dislike. Plenty of people wish Toby Keith would just shut up or that 50 Cent would quit pretending he is in anything but the highest of tax brackets. Of course, there is a certain thing we can all agree is easy to hate. That thing of disdain is obviously politicians.

During the last week, as part of a class trip, I was sent to Washington, D.C., to tour the city and hear numerous people from both governmental agencies and politicians speak. In between all the relentless walking required to get anywhere, a very unique experience took place. By being pushed closer to a situation which is normally very far from sight, it became more difficult to keep a single-view outlook on our lawmakers.

When one is pushed too closely to a painting, it becomes impossible to see the big picture, but in the same vein, when one is thrust too far from the same painting, the details become obscured. Most of the average person’s life is spent standing extremely far from what happens in the nation’s capital. From that vantage point, sweeping generalizations and oversimplifications are easy. The details and realities of the process are often too blurry for anything else.

Therefore, when the goings-on of D.C. are right in your face, the effect is blinding. Nobody likes to find out they were wrong. Even the most humble person would still prefer and hope that they are right every single time and feels a tinge of regret when they are not. While this happened repeatedly during my four days in Washington, it was never more clear than when the subject of budgets came up.

It would be wonderful to think that a member of Congress should know exactly what they are voting on and understand all the issues, but this is not 1801. Just dealing with the budget of one governmental agency involves pouring through thousands of pages of documents just to get a basic understanding of the issue. The only way to deal with this for the member of Congress is to farm it out to another person and have them report back.  It seems when one elects a state representative, they are better off knowing the candidate’s staff than the actual person.

Again though, there is a flaw in the logic. When one is standing in the office of a member of Congress, they are way too close to the situation to see the big picture. Personal sympathy and understanding are all well and good, but when it comes to managing a large nation, it is far more important to worry about getting the job done right. When standing inches from a person’s problem, it can be difficult to see they are the ones who caused it.

There simply must be a balance struck between the two opposing views to reconcile toward reality. To sit back and recklessly spout rhetoric from afar is no better than lying around enabling the continuing failures out of a kind understanding. If one can realize there are problems which should be driving any thinking person mad, but on the same hand, can understand the solutions are never as easily done as spoken, then they are one step closer to truly grasping national politics.

Our state gets 93 percent of its electricity from coal, but there are people in our state dedicated to stopping the mining practices that sustain that number. From afar it is easy to pick a side in the battle. On the other hand, up close it can become nearly impossible since both sides are looking one directly in the face.

Balancing the two views, standing at the exact right distance from the situation, is extremely difficult, but it has to be done. The hard path, like in most instances, is the correct path here, but only by being thrust into both of the easier paths and seeing their flaws is this evident. It’s easy to hate politicians from afar, but it is quite a bit more difficult to understand them.