Pondering the political future

I sometimes wonder about politics and people. By "people", I mean the average voter. Even that is a misnomer, there are no average voters. Most of us vote for candidates for rather obscure and personal reasons. We like his/her looks, we agree with some/most of the things the candidate has been saying, he/she is supported by our political party or our union (or both), and maybe because we just don't like the opponent's political party, policy statements, looks, and/or we accept what is being said about him/her.

It seems to me that a significant number of voters make their decisions on who to vote for when they are in the voting booth. I, myself, have been guilty of that on occasion. That decision is usually (in my own opinion) not a good one. It is often based on emotional reaction to the perceptions I have about the candidates. Those perceptions might be entirely wrong.

We are often manipulated by political rhetoric and by the machinations of political campaigns. We do not get "pure" information about the candidates. Instead, each campaign does its best to feed the potential voters positive things about its candidate(s) and negative things about the other candidate(s).

How do we choose what is true and what is false?

I am thinking about this because there seems to be a kerfuffle brewing around Glenn Beck and George Soros. Beck has been drawing a picture of Soros as a meglo-maniacal "puppet master", manipulating the country and nudging it toward some progressive Utopian image he has conjured up which would undermine the One True Image that Beck has of America.

I am, of course, a person who believes very little to be what it appears. Good people aren't always good, bad people aren't always bad.

George Soros operates some organizations which fund, or perform, great acts of charity. His organizations also raise money by working the various markets, taking advantage of speculative trading and market trends and (some say) helping to create those trends through speculative trading of their own.

I am not sure what is true or false. I just ponder these things now. And a part of me worries.