Every election year, it seems we deal with swings from one side to another. The pendulum theory is something we in manufacturing (There’s actually a few of us left here in America) deal with on a daily basis.

Basically it’s goes like this:

A problem occurs on the production floor. A quality issue is the most common. We have all kinds of procedures in place already to avoid the issue, however something or someone failed. So instead of taking care of the mechanical problem or the people problem, we institute MORE safeguards, more redundancy, more procedures that are not only benign but cause more problems down the line due to time spent on NEW procedures. A visual diagram of this would resemble a pendulum. The center being normal, after the issue the pendulum would swing HARD to one side, once that becomes normal the pendulum comes back until the next issue…..

I liken the pendulum theory to our Presidential elections:

Lets say our pendulum was centered prior to Carter (I know that is a piss poor time frame, but hey I’m not old enough to remember much about the prior POTUS’s) Carter moved the pendulum hard left, all the way up. Four years later we got Reagan, who moved the pendulum from the far left position to center right. It was a big swing in the area of the pendulum, but it didn’t move it all the way right. Reagan who we’ll call the nominal center, being this nation has always been center right. Although it was not dead center it was not too far right as to defy gravity. We stabilized over 12 years with various small moves one way or another. We then swung the pendulum left, past center again with the election of Clinton. Although, again not such a swing as Carter, it defied gravity a little at first but we got it back to left of center through various elections… So we sat slightly left of center for 8 years, then we got GWB and while many thought we were swinging wildly right we actually only moved it to center right, again defying gravity a little bit but still not wildly right. For 8 years we danced around the dead center of the pendulum radius…. Obama came in and we moved the pendulum far left another BIG swing, further than CARTER moved it at the beginning and here we sit…

The question is how far do we wish to move the pendulum this time? IF you put Obama far left, and I would say Ron Paul is the far right.

Do you think moving the country that far would actually solve anything?

We are a center right nation. At NO TIME in our history has the pendulum stayed at the furthest left position and our country been better off. What makes you think all the way RIGHT would be any different?

What I’m asking is, would it be better to swing back to the NORMAL, rather than the extreme? IF you support Ron Paul, you believe that a radical change is needed. I can agree with that. But at no time in our history have we went from one extreme to another in one fell swoop. That kind of swing may make some folks bat shit crazy and it probably won’t last more than 2 years. I’m thinking someone like Paul, who’s ideas are pretty far out there pertaining to foreign policy would be a shock to the system we’ve never had. However; a move from center right, to far right would be more acceptable to the masses…

As of now I can’t see Ron Paul winning the nomination. However; to those Paulies that will come here and parrot the Paul views, I’ll throw out this caveat: IF you honestly believe Paul’s views are the correct views for our nation. Tell Paul to drop out of the race and ADVISE another candidate. He could do more from that position than he will ever do where he is now. His son Rand may see the inside of the White House but I’m betting Ron wont.