I rarely blog about politics (quite on purpose), but one thing I noticed about last night’s “Town Hall” Presidential debate was that it really wasn’t a town hall. The people in attendance were mostly like props – they were extraordinarily constrained.

The only woman who looked like she had any passion about her question to the candidates was Teresa Finch, who asked

How can we trust either of you with our money when both parties got us into this global economic crisis?

Obama answered first. He blamed George W. Bush (as well as McCain) and then said

I’m going to spend some money on the key issues that we’ve got to work on.

He said those issues included (1) energy, (2) college affordability, and (3) a net spending cut.

McCain’s response was

The system in Washington is broken.

He talked about his record of reform and attacked Obama, mostly on spending. McCain then briefly mentioned that he had proposals for the economy and that we need energy independence (consisting, in part, of drilling offshore and nuclear power).

Neither candidate answered the question of trust. Obama said he would continue to spend money. McCain didn’t really say much at all. This underscores the problem with the debate, with the current political climate, and with the current economy – a lack of trust.

The candidates and their campaigns did not trust the town-hall style format last night, setting all sorts of rules in place and preventing true discussion of issues. So the debate failed to be an effective town-hall. The debate failed to tell us much new about the candidates or their views.

The American people do not trust Washington – or its Senators – to fix anything, especially when Washington’s best attempt at a so-called financial rescue plan is laden with irrelevant pork spending, once again. Neither does it inspire trust when the candidates are asked for a response to this problem, and they reply with attacks on the candidates’ perceived opponents.

Wall Street and the Big Banks do not seem to trust each other, the government, or anybody else. So they seem to think that not doing business is the best way to deal with that.

The greatest problem facing America today is a lack of trust. It is dubious that candidates recognize this or can do anything about it. Congress is self-defeating; whenever it tries to “fix” anything, the problem typically worsens. Thus, Washington is impotent to deal with America’s trust crisis.

This is not new – government almost always appears to act in a self-defeating manner, primarily because people are self-interested and short-sighted. Am I being cynical? Perhaps, but I believe people are basically selfish, hence the root of these problems. How about you? What do you think?