voter segmentation

It is practically unavoidable to read on the intarwebs today without running into posts on the Obama/Clinton primary race. Often these posts rely heavily on opinion polls, sampling, and well thought-out grouping of individuals to gauge their interest over a set time period. These are the tactics and tools of marketers, not servants of the people, and most certainly not of grand leaders.

It’s disturbing how many people have been sucked into the notion of a presidential candidate as a product, packaged brightly for consumption by the largest target market possible. We no longer are Americans, we are Black Americans, White Americans, Female Americans, Male Americans, Poor Americans, Rich Americans, Christian Americans, Jewish Americans. We are market-segments, not individuals. We are consumers of a product, not voters of a leader. The insurgence of marketing into politics, our perfection of its methods, and the dumbing-down of the general populace all work hand-in-hand towards the goal of the annihilation of personal liberty and individual thought. The dumbest 51% will hold all of us in shackles, as the lowest common denominator will rule over us.

In the free market, if a product is put forth people either buy it or don’t. If no one purchases it, the product is a failure. Imagine if our currency were our votes, and if the product that is already being marketed to us could be rejected by our saving our vote for a better product. 25% of the population (half of the voting populace) would no longer be able to buy a shoddy product on behalf of the rest of us who choose not to waste our money. No more could clinching narrow market-segments mean victory or defeat — a candidate would have to appeal to ALL Americans as individuals.