Enlightened liberals and a reconsideration of "emotional" political tactics

I've just finished reading the Power of Now which is a great spiritual inspiration and a call for emotional balance in one's life. The idea of enlightenment becomes simple...live in the present, the NOW and nothing should bother you! Become close to that watcher inside of you and you will be at peace (not necessarily HAPPY) all the time; plugged into God (the Source, the inexplicable unmanifested consciousness that unifies all of life) inside and shared by all of us; although we are our own point of consciousness within the greater whole.

One sign of an enlightened individual is one who can state their position without defensiveness, fear, anger, etc.

This makes me rethink the appeal to "emotional" voters. Anger and defensiveness are based on fear...and who needs to show or appeal to fear? The Right. I'm not against liberals "using" emotion to win elections; but we must acknowledge that this would be an absolute fake to such an enlightened individual. The only thing that Obama lacks, according to the Eckhardt definition if I may, is too much of an identification with Obama's ego. He must realize that he cannot control how the "image" of Obama is spun, he should not worry about it! It's like he's an artist and the artist's intention matter's very little to the resulting work of art, or in this case, to his political candidacy.

I haven't watched the Lehrer Newshour in months; I used to watch it daily. My husband and I started getting angry with it because they constantly put on a "liberal" and a "conservative" viewpoint. And usually, the conservative is living in La La land, in total denial, and lies are the truth. It's maddening to see it. So tonight I watched again and they had two former Justice Department officials on, I believe the woman was from Clinton's administration and the man was definitely from Reagan's.

The Reagan Justice Dept. guy was visibly angry when he made his arguments, that basically the Justice Dept. is just fine, it's the press and "partisanship" that are giving it all a bad name. DENIAL! His anger and defensiveness was clearly registering over the TV waves. I was actually thinking it was HIS partisanship that was making him defensiveness (criticisms of others are always about us--believe me, I'm angry and defensive a lot!). On the other hand, the Clinton (I think, possibly Carter) Justice Dept. veteran was cool and collected when she made her arguments. She spoke second. She absolutely disagreed with the Reagan guy but didn't get mad or seem upset. She made her arguments with authority and without passion. She was right--the problems in the Justice Department are real and she gave evidence of it. She had to say the obvious and the opposite of angry man to make her point! This is why the PBS news and other media news have become a farce--who takes anyone seriously when two people are saying the exact opposite of each other? It's ridiculous.

My point is, should we be won over by angry guy because he showed more emotion and passion in his arguments? Should we be even trying to appeal to voters who use emotional appeals to make their decisions? That's a ridiculous way to run a government!!

Hillary is probably the coolest candidate out there. She's seems to have her emotions well under control, and she uses humor, but she's also arguing for the status quo--so where is the passion in that? Edwards is angry and passionate about many issues that I'm angry and passionate about, and I think he's pretty enlightened about what's important in life. So is that our ideal candidate? Is he faking his passionate appeal? Maybe. Does that make him an enlightened guy who's faking emotion? Does an enlightened guy lie to show feelings...or does he go back to normal humanness and learn to exploit them instead of letting them pass through him without reaction (like I'm learning to do)?

Does Obama learn to exploit his spiritually controlled emotions for base, human appeal? I don't think he'd do it.

Looking at these three candidates, Edwards and Obama seem the most authentic. But Hillary acts like the most enlightened. Hmmm. Therefore, I think I'm in favor of voting on folks based on their ideas and values rather than their emotional and spiritual aspects. As much as we need enlightenment in this country, we could use a healthy dose of critical thinking in the interim.

Peace.