What ever happened to Aleppo? Remember back in 2015-2016 when there was fighting in Aleppo, Syria? A candidate for president of the United States was asked about the fighting in Aleppo, Syria. His reply was “What is Aleppo?” Of course he didn’t get very many votes in the election. By the end of 2016, the fighting had pretty much died down and now we don’t hear anything about it.
How quickly we forget just about everything. Now we’re into the thick of a new election. No one is questioning Aleppo but, Ukraine, Israel, Gaza are the words that might trip people up.
The candidates really should be worried about what has been determining elections for a long time. The economy still carries the most weight and brings in the most money to campaigns. That is really the only thing that matters to most people. Can I get more money at my job? Will things get better for me? Will my company get a contract that will bring in more money for my company? If I continue to contribute to a certain campaign will this be true for me?
It may be important to know the leader of Uzbekistan, but the average voter is more concerned about the price of gasoline or how much a candy costs at the convenience store.
The economy includes all the talk about the public debt. Deficit spending, repaying the debt and balancing the budget can be as simple or complicated as you want to make it. I knew one guy that had the budget balanced pretty quickly. He believed many years ago that America’s money problems came from the fact that Ronald Reagan lived in California. He was spending too much money flying back and forth to California. If he had his way, he would take the keys to Air Force One, make Reagan stay in the White House and work. He would cut the budget 5% a year, don’t give all these other countries money and it wouldn’t take long before Happy Days would be here again!!!! It worked like a charm when he took away her Belk’s credit card. A budget is a budget. Too bad it can’t be that easy.
Back to the original question of Aleppo, That’s been forgotten long ago. Remember Covid? Every week we can be worried about something else. Airlines, flash floods, or can seemingly be important and forgotten in the blink of an eye. News travels fast and bad news travels faster. Let a weekend get over and a football game that doesn’t turn out right and we will be worried about something else.
No wonder that Aleppo and the fighting in Syria have been long forgotten. They are fighting in other countries. The president still has the keys to his jet and we might have a new crisis come almost any day. Of course, you can be distracted by a close football game and not even realize that your candidate does not know where Kashmir begins and Punjab ends. Hopefully, all the candidates know the importance of the prices of gas and groceries.
Dove season and deer season are here too. With everything going on I just hope we can all get out to vote. That’s the important thing. That is better than knowing where Aleppo is.
