RedImperator wrote:As much as I said Dean was un-electable before the Democratic primaries, I think he'd be doing better right now, presuming he didn't manage to stick his foot in his mouth at some point. He could and would fire on Bush with both barrels, and he's not covered with the slime that accumulates after approximately 15,000 years in the Senate.
If Dean would have won the nomination, that would have been my first ever vote for a Democratic presidential candidate in a general election in the 20 years I've been old enough to vote.
As it is, I'm voting for Nader as a protest.
Could you at least throw your vote away to someone who's not quite so annoying and stupid?
I usually vote Libertarian for protest votes, but for some reason I feel like voting for Nader even though he doesn't have a chance in Hell.
Maybe it's so I can get a bumpersticker that reads 'Don't blame me, I voted for Nader', because no matter if either Bush or Kerry wins, the country loses.
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."- General Sir Charles Napier
I'm of two minds about the whole situation. Part of me is amazed at how well Kerry is doing considering his absolutely abysmal campaigning. The other part of me is amazed that Bush is doing so well when he so clearly sucks ass.
His strategy seems to be to not let voters know too much about Kerry the candidate and let anti-Bush sentiment do his work for him. And that may work, but it wouldn't allow him to govern effectively as President; you have to be elected by voters who support your views and agenda, not by voters whose primary objective is to unseat the incumbent, to claim a mandate, as Glenn Reynolds wrote a few weeks ago. Kerry's potential voter bloc right now is probably as big as Bush's - maybe larger - but I don't believe even a majority of his voting bloc is particularly excited about him as a candidate, they just want to unseat Bush. A candidate who derives any large portion of his votes from people who think like the "John Kerry is a douchebag but I'm voting for him anyway" simply isn't going to be able to claim to the kind of support in the long run needed to be an effective President.
BoTM / JL / MM / HAB / VRWC / Horseman
I'm studying for the CPA exam. Have a nice summer, and if you're down just sit back and realize that Joe is off somewhere, doing much worse than you are.
Joe wrote:His strategy seems to be to not let voters know too much about Kerry the candidate and let anti-Bush sentiment do his work for him.
Kerry's entire strategy is to be the 'Inevitable Man', holding a banner with the vacuous title "Not Bush".
Yeah democracy!
Sometimes I wish we could do what the Athenians did. Take a vote to see who is the most dangerous person to democracy and ostracize them for a year or two.
I think Kerry's sole strength really is "not Bush" and that is it. It appears that he is hoping that Bush will self-destruct as Dean did, leaving the field open for him. If Kerry had a leg to stand on, he'd be dancing on it.
Something about Libertarianism always bothered me. Then one day, I realized what it was:
Libertarian philosophy can be boiled down to the phrase, "Work Will Make You Free."
In Libertarianism, there is no Government, so the Bosses are free to exploit the Workers.
In Communism, there is no Government, so the Workers are free to exploit the Bosses.
So in Libertarianism, man exploits man, but in Communism, its the other way around! If all you want to do is have some harmless, mindless fun, go H3RE INST3ADZ0RZ!! Grrr! Fight my Brute, you pansy!
Darth Wong wrote:The Democratic Party, in its infinite wisdom, chose a candidate for President who originally agreed with Bush on the decision to invade Iraq. This is not an insignificant handicap when attempting to take Bush to task on the consequencs of that decision.
he voted for the Patriot act as well. and he has nearly the same views as Bush on Gay Marriage (Civil Unions only).
This was clearly a candidate selection based on "strategy" rather than principle. Their thinking was obviously that an "unpatriotic" position would be too unpopular, so they needed a candidate with good "patriot" credentials in order to steal votes away from Bush's popular war platform (which has since become less popular and more expensive, but hey, that's what happens when you pander).
The Democratic Party has become so fearful of being defined as something they're not by the GOP that they've succeeded in continually letting themselves be defined as something they're not by the GOP and looking like losers in the bargain. It seems they've nominated another Dukakis, and one who has all the firey quaities of an ice cube to boot.
When ballots have fairly and constitutionally decided, there can be no successful appeal back to bullets.
—Abraham Lincoln
People pray so that God won't crush them like bugs.
—Dr. Gregory House
Oil an emergency?! It's about time, Brigadier, that the leaders of this planet of yours realised that to remain dependent upon a mineral slime simply doesn't make sense.
—The Doctor "Terror Of The Zygons" (1975)
Joe wrote:His strategy seems to be to not let voters know too much about Kerry the candidate and let anti-Bush sentiment do his work for him. And that may work, but it wouldn't allow him to govern effectively as President; you have to be elected by voters who support your views and agenda, not by voters whose primary objective is to unseat the incumbent, to claim a mandate, as Glenn Reynolds wrote a few weeks ago. Kerry's potential voter bloc right now is probably as big as Bush's - maybe larger - but I don't believe even a majority of his voting bloc is particularly excited about him as a candidate, they just want to unseat Bush. A candidate who derives any large portion of his votes from people who think like the "John Kerry is a douchebag but I'm voting for him anyway" simply isn't going to be able to claim to the kind of support in the long run needed to be an effective President.
Well it's not like an incumbent who sucks at being president is going to be an effective president either. And frankly, getting Bush out of office is a fringe benefit to me. Waving good-bye to his administration (Cheney, Powell, Rumsfeld, Rice, et al) is the real gain if Kerry wins.
Damien Sorresso
"Ever see what them computa bitchez do to numbas? It ain't natural. Numbas ain't supposed to be code, they supposed to quantify shit."
- The Onion
Durandal wrote:And he's right. We've heard barely a peep out of Kerry, when she should be firing a full salvo at Bush for his total ineptitude. Instead, he seems to have been affected by the same pussification that's overtaken the entire Democratic party since 9/11.
Eeryone's afraid, though not to extent that they were three years ago, to speak out against the regime in this 'patriotic times'. However, Kerry really does need to get off his ass and get the votes. Either way, I've got a very bad feeling that we're going to be stuck with a jackass for another four years...
