“When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?”

John Maynard Keynes, the influential British economist whose ideas are known as Keynesian Economics, sums up how I feel about the overused American political term “flip-flop”:

When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?

Well sir, I change my mind as well. But I don’t count. I’m a regular guy dealing with an ever-changing situation at work were I have to constantly flip-flop due to layoffs, company strategy, and overall business strangeness due to my supervisory position. Guess we regular folks have leeway in our lives where politicians don’t.

As you can tell, I’m no fan of the term “flip-flop”. And during this election season, I’m giving both Senators (Obama and McCain) leeway simply because we are in a transitory period in America. There are high levels of uncertainty in the electorate that haven’t been seen in a long time. High fuel prices, the vanishing of big manufacturing, more and more globalization, two mostly-unpopular wars, increasing food prices, increasing higher education, etc. This transition period in America is causing the facts to change “on the ground” faster than what Obama and McCain probably expected. So I’m treating them like regular guys. I’m giving them leeway.

I want to see the overall package at the end of the campaigning. Then I will cast my vote on that November day. We’ll see whose “flip-flops” makes their overall package more appealing.