Bringing up voters

I live in a house divided.
Forget red states and blue states. We have red rooms and blue rooms.
How my husband and I have managed to stay together through five presidential elections is nothing short of a Bill Clinton-inspired miracle. (Our first fight was over Bush-Dukakis. Even today, the memory of Chris’ smug retorts still burns my bottom.)
When I was pregnant with our daughter, we argued whether we were having a little Democrat or a little Republican. We were kidding. Really.

But now that Emma is 9 and John is 5, it’s not so funny.
“I like Barack Obama,” Emma cooed recently. “He’s cute.”
“I like him too,” John chimed in. “He sounds like a wrestler. Ba-Rock!”
Chris wasn’t home to hear this. This was good, because on the one hand, I was thrilled my kids like Obama. But because he’s cute? I’m failing miserably as a parent here.
A few nights later, Chris got his own reality check.
He and John were sitting on the sofa, side by side, watching baseball, as I passed through the room.

“Do you know what just happened?” Chris asks me. “A commercial for McCain just came on. Our son doesn’t know who John McCain is.”
I roll my eyes. (He hates this. If he ever leaves me, this will be part of the reason. The divorce papers will mention “excessive eye rolling.” Wolf Blitzer will discuss it in The Situtation Room: “Can you divorce someone for rolling their eyes? This man is trying to do just that ...” But I digress.)
“Of course he does,” I say reassuringly.
“He’s the old guy in the commercial,” John blurts.
Ouch.
Somewhere between T-ball practice, the Disney Channel, and fighting over who feeds the dog, Chris and I had stopped talking politics. We no longer discuss health-care reform, military buildup or economic policy. We used to. But somehow our kids took over dinner conversation as soon as they learned to talk.

I know more about the Jonas Brothers than my kids know about what happens on the second Tuesday in November. That’s a sad fact. I’m not proud of it, but I suspect we aren’t the only parents guilty of doing a shoddy job of teaching our kids about the electoral process.
Chris and I need to do better.
So, we’re talking politics in our house again. We disagree a lot. The kids interrupt a lot. They look bored a lot. But that’s OK. I remember my parents arguing over Ford and Carter while I watched Scooby-Doo. The point is I at least knew that the two guys they were talking about were more than TV characters.
Emma still thinks Barack Obama is cute. John still thinks John McCain is old.
But they haven’t decided who they’ll root for in November.