SWGA Politics

An open letter from Joel McElhannon regarding Speaker Richardson’s announcement was put up on PeachPundit, and there is a piece of it I wanted to discuss here:

The vast majority of arm chair activists, pundits, editorialists, and bloggers should do themselves a favor and just shut up.

You have never had the courage or ability to hold public office, so you have no concept of the pressures those with that courage and ability must endure. After dealing with legitimate constituent problems, crazy calls at all hours about dogs barking and obnoxious neighbors, election challenges, political forces pushing them in every direction, and the pressure all of this puts on their family, to have to endure your ridiculous rants and stunningly uninformed cheap shots is a special kind of hell. Spare us your hyperventilating.

Maybe I’m one of the exceptions when he says the “vast majority”. I certainly hope so. Because unlike a great deal of my counterparts both in blogging and within the Libertarian Party, I’ve done something over the last few months that I think qualifies me for an intelligent discussion on this. I actually ran for political office. Yes, I lost. I’ll even admit that I lost pretty handily. But my name WAS on a ballot, and that DOES separate me from the “vast majority of arm chair activists, pundits, editorialists, and bloggers”.
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