Why, yes, I do like to caption. Why do you ask?

Sometimes ignorance is strength

Now that election addicts have nothing to talk about but each other, I can come out of the closet as a Low Information Voter.

This thing started two years ago, mostly as a sideshow. There were no less than 20 people running for president. Some of them were Serious, some of them were laughable. Tancredo alternately pissed me off and made me laugh with his chutzpa. Ideal job? President! Hey, that's why I'm here!

I actually laughed when Obama said he'd meet with Iran's president (no, I don't feel like looking up the spelling - low information, remember?). I thought at the time it was a great way to get attention. There were still so many people running at the time that it made him stand out, if only at the bottom of a dogpile. Bad publicity is good publicity.

So, I missed a lot of stuff. Stuff that didn't even matter in the end.

"Low-inf", though, doesn't necessarily translate to "not paying attention". Not voting is considered a dereliction of duty in my family. Voting without having your facts straight is just as bad a sin.

Know what you want, and how they match up. So I took this little test:

From here:

Here's how it works, if you want to know. If you agree with a candidate, he gets point(s). If you disagree, take point(s) away. Unkown/other results in no points. The number of points given or taken depends on the weight you set. "Meh" is worth 1 point, "important" 2, and "key" is worth 5. The items you disagree about will be listed directly underneath each candidate (if they score greater than zero).

And the results:

Kucinich 71 No Child Left Behind, Border Fence
Gravel 68 (you have no disagreements with this candidate)
Obama 46 Patriot Act, Border Fence, Iran Sanctions, Same-Sex Marriage
Edwards 42 Death Penalty, No Child Left Behind, Patriot Act, Iran Sanctions, Iran - Military Action, Same-Sex Marriage
Clinton 39 Death Penalty, No Child Left Behind, Patriot Act, Border Fence, Iran Sanctions, Iran - Military Action, Same-Sex Marriage
Richardson 38 Death Penalty, Assault Weapons Ban, Patriot Act, Iran Sanctions, Iran - Military Action, Same-Sex Marriage
Biden 38 Death Penalty, No Child Left Behind, Patriot Act, Border Fence, Iran Sanctions, Same-Sex Marriage
Dodd 37 Death Penalty, No Child Left Behind, Patriot Act, Border Fence, Iran Sanctions, Iran - Military Action

Paul 19 Abortion Rights, Embryonic Stem Cells, ANWR Drilling, Kyoto, Assault Weapons Ban, Guns - Background Checks, Citizenship Path for Illegals, Border Fence, Net Neutrality, Minimum Wage Increase, Same-Sex Marriage, Universal Healthcare
Cox -15
McCain -29
Thompson -30
Giuliani -37
Brownback -41
Huckabee -54
Tancredo -64
Romney -69
Hunter -82

So I definitely knew who I wouldn't be voting for.

Picking out who I would vote for was harder. In my "gut" I was mostly stuck between Edwards and Richardson early on. Clinton had lost me a long time ago with her triangulation and deeply entrenched position in the "Strategic Class" - too close to the money. I had the same beef with her that I had with Mr. Clinton - "Stand for something!" was my usual complaint. Kucinich is an easy vote in the primaries, because hey, Texas isn't a swing state, so let's bump up the issues for a change, eh?

Edwards had spent the last four years talking up the "Two Americas" as part of the 50-state plan (all hail Howard Dean, y'all). Richardson had actually been (hell, still is) an executive. He'd also had real, actual foreign policy experience.

Gravel I knew nothing about, and for me was "meh". No disagreements doesn't mean agreement. He didn't capture my attention at all. Same with Biden.

Obama? Roll eyes, hard. I think the exact quote I used at the time was "pretty boy". If I objected to Clinton on the "what has she done in the Senate, really?" then all of that applied twice as hard to him.

So, on to the races. People dropped out quickly and faster than anyone had anticipated. I wasn't sorry to see Giuliani (9/11!) Or Fred Thompson (he was awful on Law & Order, too. I stopped watching) go. I was sorry to see Kucinich drop out early. I was intrigued by the Obama endorsement, but still thought he was too new.

Edwards dropped out. Then Richardson. Well, so much for that. This is how we get the best of the best?

Then it was primary time in Texas. '04 was the first time I'd ever voted in a primary. Well, I wasn't holding my nose but I was crossing my fingers for luck. Obama. More against Clinton, really.

We flipped a coin and my husband got to try to caucus, but couldn't get there before the doors closed. It was chaos central according to one person who was there but had to leave early.

Sooooo, horse race horse race. Lawyers doin' stuff, deals being made. Hey, endorsements from Edwards and Richardson. Oooh, Michigan and Florida. You know they're going to be let in. Like wayward children out past curfew, they'll be grounded for a while but let back in the house.

And on this side we have McCain? How the heck did that happen? Well, whatever. Even if I don't like Clinton, I'm sure not voting for this guy. He was admirable in 2000, and McCain Feingold was really something, but not now, man. You sold your soul. And Palin? Hell, no.

So, onto the real race, the debates, and whatnot. I'm starting to like this Obama guy, and start reading up on him. Well, shit. Can't hurt, might help. And here we are.

The one time I got emotional was when I saw Jesse Jackson in tears at Grant Park. I remember his '88 run, and I was finally old enough to vote. I spent the summer talking politics with my dad, like a real grownup, and we were both disappointed that he didn't make the ticket. He forged the path, and there's nowhere to go but up.

An open letter to Barack Obama

President-elect Obama:

I'm glad to be one of many, many people who congratulate your historic win. I was not one of your original supporters, but I have been impressed with the way you conducted yourself, your campaign, and with the way your empowerment philosophy has trickled all the way down to the volunteers on the street. Truly, you have been a uniter.

The office you will be holding has changed dramatically since its inception, and greatly even in my own memory. George Bush has changed it almost beyond recognition. I think that one of the reasons that people have become so divided over politics and the presidency is because the position has become so powerful, and so people are desperate to get "their guy" in.

Most of this power has come from the abuse of the Executive Order. John Quincy Adams issued a grand total of two Executive Orders, one lamenting the passing of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, and the other lamenting the passing of Major-General Jacob Brown.

The last numbered EO (as of October 9th) is 13476.

I first became aware of the extent of this power in 2001, as President Bush started unraveling the good things that President Clinton had done when he was in the White House. What astonished me was not the unraveling, but the fact that this good had been accomplished by Executive Order and not by working with the Congress.

This cannot continue. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. The Executive Order can be used to good ends, but when it becomes a way to bypass Congress routinely, and to cut the people's representatives out of the governing process, it becomes a trap, a drug, a temptation to increase itself for the sake of gathering more and more power to the executive.

I understand that on Day One, there are many wrongs that could be put right, just by reversing Bush's reversals of Clinton's reversals of Bush and Reagan. Then what? It may be politically difficult, but perhaps the best move in this game is simply not to play. Work it the way you're supposed to, with the Congress.

Even more odious are the Signing Statements, and the way they have been transformed and deformed by President Bush. He refused to play by the Constitutional rules and veto bills he didn't like, opting instead to simply ignore the law of the land. You know as well as I that that is not the Rule of Law, it is the Law of Rule.

In his book "A World Waiting to be Born", M. Scott Peck observed that the only legitimate reason to gather power is to give it away, to share, to empower. This is what I watched you do with your people over the last two years. Please continue this work.

Respectfully yours.

An open letter to John McCain

Hon. Senator McCain:

I want to thank you for your decades of service to our country. You have been a dedicated public servant, and when you have taken principled stands, you've been eloquent in word and deed.

I was glad that you took the high road in regards to campaign finance, even in this presidential election. I know that the Obama campaign's ability to outspend your campaign was one of the factors contributing to your defeat.

I do not consider Obama's victory a defeat for campaign finance reform. I see this as pointing out the desperate need for more reform. If the two of you had been working on a level playing field, then the election process would truly have been more of one decided on the basis of ideas, of character, and philosophy.

Instead it was a contest of who could go lower, and when. And that was you, sir.

To "counter the spending", your campaign took the low road, something that you had refused to do in the 2000 campaign. Your campaign and the people surrounding you resorted to some of the lowest, uncommon denominators: name calling, misdirection, and lies.

Those actions made me angry. It's not principled to refuse to condemn those actions, it's bullheaded stubbornness. It's not principled to pick a running mate for her perceived electability while ignoring her capacity for governance, it's blatant pandering. It also indicates contempt for me and my fellow citizens.

We're not stupid, we know that the political process has been subverted by organized money, by ideolouges, by lobbyists. We see it's effects every day. We saw it take you down in a terrible, terrible way.

I'm not writing you to gloat. I'm not writing you to put salt in your wounds. I'm writing to you as a citizen, petitioning a senior member of the Senate to put right the wrongs that face us today.

You pledged to bring honor and integrity to the White House. You pledged that you would bring change. The White House isn't the only place that change is needed. Honor and integrity also belong in the House and Senate. They're needed in the judiciary. They're needed in all aspects of our government, so that it returns to being government by the people, of the people and for the people.

You have two years to go in your Senate term. I hope that you stay and fight. I want you to tell the story of your campaign, and what money and lack of it did to your run for the White House. I want you to highlight the ways that your own bill has been subverted and perverted by money and special interests.

McCain-Feingold was what made me respect you back in the day. Your honesty and integrity in the 2000 campaign made me hopeful that the Republican party could be loyal opposition if out of power, and responsible governors when in power. You know how you were taken down then. Your campaign tried some of the same tricks this time around, and it didn't work. It doesn't have to be this way, and you are in a position to make sure it doesn't happen again.

You said once that you wanted to be president in the best way. You went about it this time in the worst way. It cost you the election, and the country a fair chance at evalutating you and Mr. Obama on your respective merits.

Please sir, do not give up on the United States. We still need you.

Respectfully yours.

Click the image to get the whole effect

VOTE.


That is all.