When I was a teenager and forming my political opinions, I liked to argue politics because it helped me see different points of view and shape what I believed. Nowadays I'm old and set in my ways and I need blood pressure medication to even contemplate a good political discussion.

That said, I did structure my college writing class around media texts, which involves a lot of politics, and I have been loving the class discussions we've been having. It hasn't been ideologically centered...for instance, we analyzed the rhetorical content of inaugural speeches...and that kind of discussion has been less fraught with the usual epithets, inflexibility, and name-calling than the typical political "discussion." I imagine it'll get even more interesting (and less overtly political) when we start reading 1984. :)

I consider myself a very political person, but I no longer live in a climate where many people share my opinions, so it's easier to keep my head down. I don't like to convert people, and irrationality makes me crazy.

in what context are politicians quoting you?

Personally I like talking politics <as though my interest is an unknown quantity> but prefer to look at in a larger ideological context. The individual issues and minutiae do not interest me as much as the underpinning thought.

JSin

l'm going to be honest and say that l really don't like talking politics. ln order to fully hold my own in a political discussion, l'd have to know *all* the players (l'm an all or nothing kind of girl, and generally like to know what l'm talking about in such matters), and that would mean taking an immense of my time to research all players, old and new, in order to have the most fully informed opinion l could have. Add to that my neurological issues that allow me to retain only a percentage of what l read or research, l'm bound to get blindsided. Add to THAT the inevitable arguments that ensue and eventually whittle themselves down to a battle of ego and who's right and wrong, and l find less and less that l care to discuss it.

On the other hand, l know everything about Kenyan politics, not because l lived there, but because it is a brand-new democracy and therefore an essentially blank slate - SO much potential there. The States has been around THIS long and still, we are such babies when it comes to learning from our political lessons and decisions that l find myself losing hope that we'll ever actually get a clue. l'm encouraged by Obama's appointment to office -which frankly, l didn't think was going to happen, though l made sure l played my part- so l observe from a distance, and form my own opinions. But at the end of the day, the older l get, l find that discussion of politics in a country that should know better by now is merely a soapbox on which everyone else insists on having a say. Whether it makes a valid impact or not.

YMMV, of course.

I stay out of politics, save the occasional vote or letter.

I'm am extremely liberal/marxist/etc by nature so politics and public policy are generally too right-of-center to muster any interest other than annoyance.

The issues that I think are biggest in out government are dysfunctions in Congress like lobbies, earmarks, and filibusters. Though I know those issues seem almost humorous because they are so blatantly corrupt and simple to legislate against, but our government can't seem to achieve that.

Education funding is a big issue to me. I think all schools should be funded equally per capita rather than having heavily funded schools in wealthy areas and underfunded schools in poor areas. The conspiracy theorist in me suspects that this issue is not resolved in a deliberate effort to maintain a poor and undereducated class to stock the military with hungry hopeless youngsters.