The US election starts tomorrow. Weird, huh? With all of the hot air blown around over the past 2 years, you could be forgiven for thinking that the election began in 2006.
Not so, my poll addicted friends. The campaigns and punditry started in 2006. The election only kicks off tomorrow and - a chadless God willing - it will end tomorrow, too.
Naturally the press will want to see it finished much sooner than that. As always, watch for the small numeral in the corner of the screen followed by a percentage sign. That is the amount of a state's polls reporting in. Note that the number is so small you can't read it without headbutting your TV set. When the number reaches 4 or 5, news "analysts" will already be calling the state for Obama or...well, leave it at that.
The media's been playing that game for decades, and I guess they always will, but I never get used to it. It is patently absurd to have news stations "calling" an election for someone when a night shift voter out west is still in the sack. Hence, why the news stations consistently call states early for the Democrat. Maybe the idiot Republicans in flyover country will see the election's already in the bag, roll over, and go back to sleep.
Here's my no BS assessment on what I think of the politicians in this race. It's no secret by now that I do not like the idea of an Obama presidency. But I am also on the record long ago as saying that I didn't like McCain and thought he might even be a little nuts.
My breakdowns:
Obama:
- Inexperienced. He's been in the Senate for three years and has spent two of them on the road, running for president.
- Liar. His relationships with Ayers, Wright, Khalidi and Rezko. Everybody he knows is just another dude from the neighbourhood. Yeah, yeah, these days it's a smear to bring up a guy's friends as examples of his character, but what can I say? It's how I often judge people.
- Corrupt. His campaign has been receiving fraudulent donations for months, and the security checks on his website were purposefully turned off long ago. All of the money his campaign and the media have been bragging about is extremely suspect.
- Liar. He said he'd take public financing, then didn't. Because he didn't feel like it.
- Weirdo. He wants to raise taxes during a recession, and brags that his global warming platform will bankrupt the coal industry. Sounds great, huh? So I guess the past two months have taught us that bankruptcy is actually a good thing.
- Hypocrite. His aunt lives in public housing in Boston, while he's written a couple of bestsellers and lives high on a senator's salary. So much for spreading the wealth around. Then when told his aunt is an illegal immigrant, he says she should get on the boat and go home. Listen to his heart, boom, boom, boom.
- Ineligible. He thinks the constitution is in need of revamping, though the job of a president is to protect and defend the constitution.
- Grating. Every one of his sentences is broken into thirds, fourths, or fifths. "Today is the day...when we will...make real change happen...in America...Sometimes I think...to myself that...I should learn to talk...so one paragraph...won't take a half...an hour...Sorry."
- Still not in my spellchecker, so all of my Obama blogs get bogged down with "skipping." I find this mildly amusing. Surely he's famous enough to have his name in the spellchecker by now.
McCain:
- Old. As I heard a radio guy say the other day, he's old in all the ways you don't want to be old. He isn't grandpa-on-the-rocking-chair old, he's grouchy-uncle-in-the-garage old.
- Experienced. But that scares me, too. An "experienced" senator can be like a good wine or a rotten turnip. More often than not, it's the latter.
- Liar. Says "my friends," a lot, even when talking to reporters. John, you're protesting too much.
- Slow. He isn't dumb-slow, but he's super duper slow with a comeback. Many former presidential contenders would have had Obama for lunch during those debates. Instead, McCain wanted to go back to talking about "wind, solar, tide, clean coal..." blah blah blah.
- War hero. Five years in a POW box should count for a lot. The media don't care about it much because war is icky and Vietnam was bad, but I still think the man deserves a hell of a lot of credit.
- Noble to a fault. Defended Obama against any smears during his rallies, calling him a decent family man and all the rest. That's fine, but he also wouldn't touch Rev. Wright and seemed as if he'd never heard of the guy. I know a lot of people that think the Republicans ran a smear campaign this year. They're mostly my Canadian friends, who think Republicans are Satan's spawn. Even if you believe the Republican smear stuff, you can't pin that on McCain.
- Never gets that the press aren't his friends. They loved him when he was second fiddle to Bush in 2000, because their hatred was reserved for Bush. This year, McCain couldn't get over the fact that they now didn't like him. It cost him badly.
My "Hopeful Foreigner" pick: McCain. Like Thomas Sowell, I think the American people are better off choosing a disaster over a catastrophe.
Why not Obama? He's a liar, and he's corrupt. But more than that, I don't like him because I loathe a politician that smiles while saying he wants to raise taxes. It really is that simple. Might not be sexy, but there it is. I don't care who they say the new taxes will hit, because they always end up hurting everybody. Taxing the wealthy doesn't mean jack. Big shots will make their money back as soon as they can, usually by screwing the little guy with layoffs, pay cuts, and higher prices in the aisle. If the taxes get to be too high, the wealthy guy will say to hell with it and open a factory in Dublin or Tianjin. Bye-bye more jobs. And it isn't just the big shots that will get stiffed. Check out the impact Obama's plans will have on a couple of guys in Pittsburgh.
My electoral vote throw in the dark: McCain squeaks it out, 277 to 261.
If McCain wins, watch for a lot of racism stories in the press, and don't even think of seeing a celebration of the first woman vice-president in history. If Obama wins, watch for hosannas from here to Japan to Sydney. The fraudulent donations story will disappear like a righteous fart in the wind, and people will fall to their knees at the dawn of a glorious new day.
Well, at least in 3 months. There's still that matter of another president leaving office. Then when the income taxes go up...and the first coal mine goes under...and the capital gains tax goes up...and Iran, Russia, North Korea, Al Queda, the Taliban, and Venezuela decide to try their luck in the No More Cowboy sweepstakes...
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