I've been hearing people say, "This is the most important election of our time!"

[xiphias]

Personally, I think that's false. I think the most important election of our time was 2000. . . .

Comments

[voltbang.livejournal.com]

"Our time" is "right now", not 8 years ago, or even 4 years ago. People have short attention spans.

Seriously though, while we lost the 2000 election, I don't think we would have done much, if any, better had it gone the other way. Politics is in a phase where both parties are wallowing in one-upsmanship. I doubt we will be out of that stage for some time.

Ohh, results!

[bradhicks.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but we didn't know that at the time. This time we do.

[theclamsman.livejournal.com]

I agree with you, completely.

There were a LOT of WTF!?s coming from me that day in my room in San Francisco. It was something I had never seen before, ever, and it was crazy.

[madcaptenor.livejournal.com]

Yes, but this is the election of undoing what happened in that election.

[theclamsman.livejournal.com]

COulda, shoulda, woulda, whatever--but I don't think a President Gore would've ignored his briefings on terrorism, given Bill's attempt to get at al Qada/bin Laden during the impeachment (which was cynically seen by all in the media as a "distraction"). We may still have been attacked on 9/11, but if so, we certainly wouldn't be in Iraq right now.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

THIS.

Gore would have had a better chance at knowing about/preventing 9/11, but that hardly means he would have succeeded at doing it. Gore would be a one-term President, because the Republicans would have argued that a more-tough-on-terrorism President, like Bush would have been, would have prevented it. However, when whichever Republican came into office in 2004, that guy wouldn't be dealing with a quagmire in Iraq, we'd still be in Afghanistan, but things would be more stable and useful, the economy would have already started to slow, but wouldn't be headed for a crash, and the budget would be at a deficit ONLY caused by the military action in Afghanistan, rather than an OPERATIONAL deficit.

[felis-sidus.livejournal.com]

It depends on how one defines "our times", I think. If one defines "our times" as "during my lifetime", it's not possible to know whether or not the present election will turn out to be more or less important than a future election. If one defines "our times" as "up to and including the present", then one could argue that each election is the most important election because it is the best current chance to affect how things go in the future.

[vito-excalibur.livejournal.com]

Agreed, definitely. But you go on.

[dancing-kiralee.livejournal.com]

I think the phrase is an idiom, and therefore defined by the cultural consensus rather than logic.

If I wanted to define it in logical terms, I would say something like "in my lifetime up to this point with a good chance of being the most significant in my lifetime as a whole."

Or I'd forget about logic, and just say that in this time / place / culture it works out to about the last 30-40 years.

Although, come to think of it, the 1968 election 40 years ago was probably a lot more important... maybe even more important than 2000.

Kiralee

Right again!

[(Anonymous)]

I agree with that assessment: I've never thought of it quite like that before. Sad to consider. Crap! Now you've ruined my good mood. (More coffee, quickly!)

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