Post-Election Potpourri

The Rude Pundit did a good job summarizing the election.

I don't know what to think about all of the calls for the abolition of the Electoral College. It'd require amending the Constitution, would it not? The thing about the Electoral College is that it was created to make sure that no one state had more power than any other state. Now, as it is and as we've seen, a single state can still throw the balance to one side or another, but I think that if we went to a straight popular vote, you'd still have that. I know that the Republicans would be scared about that, because it would mean that New York and California would basically decided every Presidential election.

At lunch today, we heard some guys sneering at Kerry's concession speech, over the fact that there was a teleprompter set up. "He can't even make his own speech, he has to read it," was the gist of it. Jesus, at least he CAN read.

I was very disappointed in Kerry's concession speech. This is not the time for unity. I'm not uniting behind some subliterate asshole with two whores for daughters. I wanted Kerry to get up there and say something like "I love this country and all, but what the fuck is wrong with you people? My wife richer than Jesus, I'll be okay, but the rest of you dumbasses...screw you guys, I'm going home. And by the way, fuck you, George. And you, Jim DeMint."

Whatsisname, Joe Scarborough, who is a Republican, said last night that one of the things this election was was a warning to all politicians everywhere. He said something like "With every election, we're told how the youth are energized, the youth are gonna vote in record numbers, the youth are gonna make an impact, and It. Never. Happens. They let you down every time." I thought that was wise. Then they had the irrelevant P. Diddy on who was saying "The youth voted today, the youth made an impact," after all of these numbers that said just the opposite.

Ron Reagan also had a good comment--actually he had a number of them--about how among the losers this election were people who believe in science, except it really loses impact without his tone of voice and facial expression. He also made a great statement about gay marriage, which I forget now so you'll have to take my word for it. He basically came down on it the way I do, which is "What the hell is this doing up for a vote? Legal marriage has nothing to do with 'sanctity'." Of course, what it's doing up for a vote is getting people who would otherwise NOT vote riled up at the thought that some people other than themselves might actually be happy--can't have THAT! LET'S VOTE! (Hey, Jim DeMint: fuck you, you piece of shit.)

The other mindboggling one was the ballot issue from Florida about teen pregnancy, aimed at curtailing privacy rights of pregnant teenagers. I don't care much about abortion, to be honest, but this one is setting up a requirement for parental consent for teenage abortions. As one person put it, this means that kids who become pregnant through incest will have to get their rapists' permission to get an abortion, which is just an abomination. (Hey, Jim DeMint: fuck you, you piece of shit.)

Can anyone at all think of anything GOOD that's going to happen in the next four years? As my friend Matt put it, goodbye house, goodbye job, goodbye car, goodbye college tuition. To which I would add, goodbye Social Security. But hey, fund managers are gonna get rich, and oil companies are gonna get rich, so it's all okay.