Date
8 June 2015
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The Ugliest Thing I Love: Artist Eric Yahnker celebrates the chaotic beauty of American politics

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Date
8 June 2015

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The ugliest thing I love would have to be American politics. No matter how contentious, out-of-touch, groan-inducing, and eye-rollingly fallible, I find myself returning again and again to its clammy, ham-handed clutches.

As a sports-enthused youth, I would never have imagined I’d end up equally favouring back door negotiations to back door alley-oops, Senate hearings to bench clearings, partisan bickering to forearm shivering, embarrassing gaffes to a high speed crash, or litmus testing to performance enhancing. It’s an arena where the lowest common denominator meets the highest national debt, and the most egregious, full-throated jingoism earns the maximum campaign donations. So, why do I love it so? In all honesty, my affection comes from a place of hopefulness rather than cynicism. Among the flip-flopping, filibustering, philandering, shadiness, shiftiness, and shortcomings, I still believe the American political system can achieve grand things worthy of global recognition. In the meantime, let the pantsuits, policy wonks, partisans, pollsters, protestors, and polemicists get their all-too predictable freak on!

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