Pinging stuff I care about.
Bush win still seems most likely, But Kerry is making the reasonable demand that in a close race in Ohio which could decide the election, nobody gets to declare victory till all the votes are actually counted.
Works for me.
Still kind of expecting a Bush victory. Nice to have a tiny shred of hope for America for a while though.
I’m trying to remember what things were like under Reagan and the first Bush, when it seemed like there would be Republicans forever, the country would be all about war and fear and hatred of anyone who was different.
Clinton gave us hope but we should have known from the Republican death-grip on Congress that it wouldn’t last.
I’ve got to stop caring about what state the country is in.
But it’s so much harder now. I have children whose future those bastards can ruin, it’s not just my own future anymore.
The “funnel all the cash to the rich” Republicans were in power for 12 years, running the economy into the ground with their deficit spending, their weapons and wars, and it took a Democrat to bring some fiscal responsibility to the nation, and that was not to last.
I’m trying to remember back to that bleak time when I managed to just not think about where the nation was going when I could help it, because it was clear that the trajectory was downward and we were riding in a handbasket. I didn’t used to care about politics like I do. I didn’t used to think about it. I used to just assume that everything was going to shit in a few years and I’d do my best to have as non-miserable a life as I could in the meantime.
But damn Clinton he gave us hope.
And it was a false hope. Things are going the same way they’ve been going since Carter went down in flames: right and farther right and farther and farther and farther right, a gigantic scam, a joke at the expense of all but a tiny rich and connected elite…
And now I’ve got a family, and it’s their future that’s damned, not just my own.
I’m trying to remember how I used to avoid thinking about it and avoid caring.
But it was a long time ago.
Damn you, America, for letting me believe in you for a while and then taking it away.
I should have known better.
I should have known better than to hope.
Things are sounding pretty grim from the exit polls and results that are in, though it’s still a toss-up. It’s looking a lot more like Bush has indeed given us the finger. May be a while before we’re sure, unless Rehnquist’s zombie corpse rises from the grave and pronounces Bush Dark Lord Evil Dictator-For-Life and makes it legal to shoot anyone who tries to do a recount.
But it looks like things are going to go from bad to worse.
I’m chatting with someone who is in complete despair about how rotten people must be to vote for a murderer and torturer like Bush, but you know, this is nothing we didn’t know before. About half of America wants badly to reelect this monster. A tiny deviation well within the statistical margin of error determines whether or not he is in fact elected. It’s a coin toss, with global consequences, and it’s starting to look like most of us are the big losers.
UPDATE: Everybody’s calling Florida for Bush. Thanks, Jeb.
UPDATE: (hour later. couldn’t sleep.) I can’t believe this. I am going to walk around tomorrow and look at everyone I see and think “there’s about a 51% chance that this is your fault. There’s about a 51% chance that you are one of the people who ruined America.”
I wish I lived where I could vote for this guy. He’s challenging Pete Hoekstra, who according to people I know who know a lot about him is a complete and total jerkass. (He ousted the former Republican Representative in my home town of Holland, Guy Vander Jagt, by portraying him as too liberal…) (Oh, also, he vowed not to server more than 12 years when he first ran for congress, and he’s breaking that promise, running again this year…)
Mlive.com tells us:
Kimon Kotos, a first-time candidate for the U.S. House, has one of the more unusual resumes in this year’s congressional races.
From 1991 to 2001, he played drums in a California punk band called The Rotters. Kotos said Democratic officials have advised him to keep his punk background to himself as he runs in the conservative 2nd District, which has been represented by Republican Rep. Pete Hoekstra since 1992.
Kotos returned to Michigan two years ago after several decades in California, where he chaired the Democratic Party in the San Fernando Valley. He was a national field director for Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s presidential campaign from 2003 and 2004 and campaign manager for unsuccessful Michigan state Senate candidate Bob Schrauger.
Kucinich supporter and punk rocker. How can you beat that combo?
Doubt he has a chance against Pete though. Republican jerkasses are popular in these parts.