What If?: Elections

What if Presidential candidates were never seen? What if you could not even hear their voices? You would not even know their names until the person was elected. How would it change things if a candidates identity was completely secret until they won the election?

Think about it: how different would the US be today if all we knew about a candidate was what they stood for in writing? Imagine a circular or newspaper article that has Candidate 1's views, Candidate 2's view, etc. The only thing we would know to judge the person on would be on their views about the world and their country and where they stood on issues. If there was a live debate, the persons' voices would be disguised.

Doing this, though not very realistic for today's society, would take away any biases a person would have about race, religion, color, age, appearance, mobility, etc. I imagine this is kind of how it was during the first elections when all there really was to get the word out were newspapers and word of mouth. People who were hundreds of miles away from a candidate and never got to see a candidate campaign had to rely solely on what they knew about the candidate's stances on the issues that were important to the voters.

Would it be better if the "Race for the White House" was more like "The Dating Game"?:

Moderator: Candidate 1--What do you see as this country's greatest need?

Candidate 1 (in a robotic voice): Yes. Great question, Brian (Williams). I think this country
needs to get rid of the evils of "Barney, The Dinosaur" and all of its associates.

Moderator: Very interesting, Candidate 1. (Chuckles in disbelief.) Candidate 2, same
question.

Candidate 2 (in a different robotic voice): I think we need to provide free airfare to Cuba.
(audience gasps)

Moderator: Tell us more about that.

Candidate 2: Yes, Brian. Providing free airfare to Cuba to those who need major medical treatments, such as surgery or chemotherapy, would be more cost effective than providing universal health care to all of the citizens of the US. In my plan, all the undocumented people in the country illegally would provide health care locally in your hometowns. Therefore, the costs of health care would go down so much that health insurance would not even be necessary. So many of the fine immigrant in this country were once doctors and health care workers in their own country; so we would barely even need to provide them with any additional training. Plus, all of the illegal drug makers in jail would be commissioned, as part of their plea bargain before going to court, to be the manufactures of many of the popular prescription used today. Most of these guys were probably geniuses in their high school chemistry classes, right? We wouldn't have to really pay these guys to make medications, so those would be dirt cheap, too. (Crowd goes wild!)

My imagination does take me places. But maybe doing things this way (keeping a person's identity a secret) would make the election a more fair process.

What do you think?