Vice presidential privilege

Anyone see Bill Clinton on The Daily Show? That man has lost a lot of weight. My guess as to what happened is that somehow, in the backroom pagan blood ritual that the president and vice president have to take when they're sworn in, Clinton and Gore's bodies synced in a bizarre, unspeakable way that now forces them to share the same total body mass. So as Gore gets bigger, Clinton gets smaller.

I honestly can't think of what else it might be. Unless...Gore has become a literal parasite and is actually feeding off of Clinton. But that's almost too horrifying to consider. And yet...I just did.

The dishonorable presiding

Question of the day: Is Mike Huckabee really that much of an idiot, or is Ron Paul that much smarter than all of the other Republican candidates?

"Congressman, whether or not we should have gone to Iraq is a discussion the historians can have, but we're there. We bought it because we broke it. We've got a responsibility to the honor of this country and to the honor of every man and woman who has served in Iraq and ever served in our military to not leave them with anything less than the honor that they deserve," Huckabee said.

Paul then responded: "The American people didn't go in. A few people advising this administration, a small number of people called the neoconservatives hijacked our foreign policy. They're responsible, not the American people."

Huckabee retorted that the United States is one nation. "We can't be divided. We have to be one nation, under God. That means if we make a mistake, we make it as a single country: the United States of America, not the divided states of America," he said.

"No, when we make a mistake — when we make a mistake, it is the obligation of the people, through their representatives, to correct the mistake, not to continue the mistake," Paul replied.

"And that's what we do on the floor of the Senate," Huckabee said.

And then it continued, and this is the bit I woke up to this morning on NPR:

PAUL: No, we've dug a hole for ourselves and we've dug a hole for our party. We're losing elections and we're going down next year if we don't change it, and it has all to do with foreign policy and we have to wake up to this fact.

HUCKABEE: Even if we lose elections, we should not lose our honor, and that is more important (inaudible) the Republican Party.

(APPLAUSE)

PAUL: We have lost over 5,000 Americans killed in -- we've lost over 5,000 Americans over there in Afghanistan, in Iraq and plus the civilians killed. How many more you want to lose? How long are you going to be there?

How long -- what do we have to pay to save face? That's all we're doing, is saving face. It's time we came home.

(APPLAUSE)

I'm so glad that Paul used the term "save face". Is that really what Huckabee is suggesting with his "lose our honor" comment? Is that what is really important to the people who enthusiastically applauded the comment? It is, and it shows exactly what this war is and has always been about to Republican voters: just a simple show of American power, one that allows them an elitist sense of righteousness in calling themselves honorable...and implying that anyone who disagrees is not.

For the record, I don't believe that American forces should leave Iraq. I didn't think we should have gone in in the first place, but now that we're there, we have a duty to do it right and make sure that the country (or countries) are left a better place. Simply: we need to clean up our mess. But not leaving Iraq has fuck all to do with the honor of our troops, ourselves, or certainly Mike Huckabee.

I really like Ron Paul a lot, but I don't think he's right: the American people wanted to go into Iraq. Overwhelmingly.

I will admit that Huckabee has a much better voice than Paul.

Iran: the dumb and the smart

As you've all read by now, Iran is freeing the British hostages prisoners guests sailors that they've been keeping around for a couple weeks.

The dumb move: Now, no matter how much Iran knew that they were stirring the pot by taking the British into custody, did they really have to follow the Terrorist Tactics For Hostage Taking 101 textbook? Filming them saying they were being treated well and that they were clearly wrong is exactly what the majority of the Western world would expect from Middle Easterners, and it just ends up making Iran look like a terrorist-run state. I'm surprised there weren't any shots of hooded men holding Kalashnikovs to the sailor's heads.

The smart move: They did it to the British. There was news this past weekend that there was anti-Iran demonstration in London...that involved a dozen people. And that only about 7% of the country thought that the UK should ready itself for war.

Now, far be it for me to say that I'm in favor of war over stuff like this, and maybe it shows that the UK realizes that it just needs to get out of the Middle East altogether, but seriously? Whether the boat was in Iranian waters or not, the act of taking the sailors hostage was clearly intended only to send a message that Iran isn't afraid to mess with larger militaries, and won't back down at the slightest amount of pressure. So finding the country that will react to their military being taken prisoner for several weeks over a pretty small act with, "Listen, sorry for all the fuss and bother, but if you wouldn't mind finding your way to letting them go sometime in the next month or so, that would be smashing." Do it to the US, and it virtually guarantees that the next president will be as much if not more of a hawk that W.

Job well done, Iran: message sent loud and clear, knowing that all you'll get in return is a polite, but strongly-worded response. Tip for next time: track down some Canadians.

Stand by your can(didate)

Here begins a two-day salute to moments in my youth when I was accidentally smart. Day one concerns politics. Day two concerns all of humanity dying in a fiery apocalypse. Something to look forward to!

In my high school years, I went to a tutor by the name of Jack. Though he did succeed in his professional goals of making my grades better, he was also the therapist that I desperately needed at that time. I could talk to him about pretty much anything and he gave me fantastic advice. We disagreed on politics at the time, since I considered myself a Republican at the time and would rant about The Liberals. Oh, the stupidity of youth!

But while a lot of my beliefs have changed now that I'm an adult paying taxes in The Real World™, there was one thing that I said to Jack that I've remembered decades later and never stopped believing: that the first non-white and/or non-Christian and/or woman president will be a conservative.

Basically, the reasoning comes down to this: Democrats/liberals are (unfortunately) going to be seen as the "social" party. It's the conventional wisdom that's very hard to break: that if you're concerned about economics, you vote Republican, and if you're concerned about social issues, you vote Democrat. Bill Clinton got elected twice because he left the social side to his speeches and stances. Meanwhile, his campaigns were focused almost entirely on economics, and the economy was his first word in the presidency. He balanced it brilliantly.

And yet, he still barely won the elections. There are a number of moderates who believe that, even with an emphasis on economics, that to vote Democratic is risky to the economy. And whether consciously or subconsciously, there are a whole lot of people who are going to see a minority, woman or non-Christian Democratic candidate as a candidate who is all about social politics, but doesn't know anything about economics and will only push to solve all of our social problems by raising taxes. It's unfair, but it's there.

But wait! That's not all! Democrats also get raked over the coals by liberals for stupid reasons. Is Obama black enough? Does Hillary really speak to women? Meanwhile, a conservative woman or minority candidate, while getting these questions, would be held much more to policy, both by the conservatives who blindly follow them as well as the liberals who chant about them destroying the world. We've already seen it with Thatcher and Merkel. Conservative candidates are villainized out of the gate by liberals anyway, so they aren't expected to answer about what they're going to do for their own. In fact, they're even in a better position to say, "It's not about race/gender. It's about the issues," which conservatives and moderates want to hear, and the fact that this argument isn't coming from a white man means liberals have to grudgingly accept it and focus on the issues as well.

Obviously, it's a shame. But I just can't see a minority or woman Democrat taking the presidency until the barrier has been broken by someone who wins based solely on their politics, and not on their social status.

Own-colored glasses

Now that the news stations--from ABC to Comedy Central--have turned into "All Mark Foley All The Time", I figured I'd throw my hat in the ring. Because, you know, I'm right up there with those heavyweights.

There are two silver linings to this story. One is that the story that's gotten everyone so frothed up is at least about politics. Even if it's story of perversion and corruption, at least it affects the nation, unlike Jon Benet Ramsey or Scott Peterson.

The other silver lining is a selfish one, and that's that it's taken my attention away from the Nickel Mines slayings: an event so horrible that it's hard to even get my head around it enough to be upset. I don't really want to get my head around it. I don't want to think about it at all.

But beyond that, the Mark Foley stuff is incredibly bothering in its partisanship, and how the coverage and topics are proving every cynical stereotype that anyone could have about conservatives in this country. First of all, there was Newt Gingrich saying that the reason the GOP probably didn't out Foley earlier is because then people would cast them as being "gay bashers." Jon Stewart put it perfectly when he pointed out that maybe it was because Republicans are equating a 52-year-old preying on a 16-year-old with being gay that makes people think they're gay bashing. Should we condemn heterosexual marriage because of Clinton's affair?

The clincher (meaning, the thing that caused me to write about that which doesn't need to be written about any more) was Fox News making the following "accident":

...which was shown THREE times before a correction was made. The "correction" was just not to show his name--or the correct party affiliation. And the scary part is how many people choose to believe that Foley was a Democrat.

It's really scary what conservatives in this country have come to. My office-mate and I joke that, if we were to ever run for office, we'd run as Republicans, because we could do whatever we want and still get the majority of Republican support. We laugh about it, but the "joke" is honest and serious. Spend taxes at a unprecedented rate, commit the nations resources and lives to a pointless war, ratchet up the deficit...it doesn't matter. Conservatives are so dedicated to their labels that they'll give up the principles that supposedly originally guided them to conservativism in the first place just to keep from admittingg that they were ever wrong. It's a sad and scary time.

Scenarios that are hard to wrap your head around #1

It's not exactly news that Hillary Clinton has her eye on a White House run, but if she gets the nomination, who would her opponent be?

Rice?

What would this matchup do to the narrow-minded, anachronistic elements of this country? Make their heads explode, that's what. Just imagine some yokel/pighead in a voting booth, laughing at the name Hillary Clinton—one of the most hated liberals in the country (for reasons I've never figured out), who is also a woman, who was also decided by tunnel-visioned Repubs around 1993 to be an obvious lesbian (logic: liberal+woman=lesbian)—but then seeing that the opponent is not only another woman, but is also unmarried and black. That sound coming from Louisiana and Colorado is the sound of hateful people weeping at the polls.

On one hand, this seems like a pretty amazing, inspiring scenario, regardless of what you think of Rice. But on the other hand, just imagine the third party candidate that will rise up to get the votes of those who are so reactionary that they couldn't vote for ultra-conservative Rice simply because of her race and/or gender and/or marital status. It might make those rise-of-the-right fears in France from a few years ago look laughable in comparison. Which, when you think about it, is what we do best in America: upstage.

Is Martin O'Malley my downstairs neighbor?

You want some political stereotypes? There's plenty in the articles about the O'Malley rumors:

Probe of rumors about possible "probing" sought

The philandering Democrat and the ruthless Republican. Isn't that a Brothers Grimm story?

While no version or variation of the truth would surprise me, the possible truth of the Erlich staff deliberately spreading rumors about a political enemy sickens me a lot more than a man having an affair, no matter how hot Catherine O'Malley is.

And while I know that all politicians of all parties are perfectly capable and willing to destroy their opponents with whatever lies they can get people to believe, it amazes me that conservatives in this country, after so many years of whining about the liberal media conspiracy/bias have decided to become exactly what they've decried for so many years. It's one thing to have an admitted bias, but the recent stories of "fair and balanced" reporters being paid by the Bush administration to back administration plans in editorials, or of commercials backing policies disguised as news features being shown on local news channels, or of the Drudge report or an Erlich aide attempting to take down Democrats by going for the most obvious sterotype available: the affair...it's all enough to prove that most human beings, when they most object to something, will fight it by doubling the sin instead of resisting it and fighting it.

Oh, the lines!! The long, long, long, long lines!!!

Man, I just got back from voting. Lord, they weren't kidding about the long lines. I walked over to my polling place, only to find that, at the D-H line, there were THREE people in front of me. THREE!!! When I got my ballot, I had to wait for almost fifteen seconds to get a spot at a booth, and then I had to wait yet another minute behind the two people in front of me at the ballot machine. All told, the entire experience took me nearly ten minutes. TEN MINUTES!!!

Ha ha! Off-peak voting, suckers!

Put this in your pipe and please don't smoke it

There's a new bar in Logan Circle called Halo. Yeah, that's not a big deal, really, except for the fact that we'll all go there when Christian moves into the neighborhood, but the reason that it's making news is that it's smoke-free. Granted, the reason that it's smoke free was that, on the very first day that it opened, the smoke in the tiny club about suffocated everyone in there, but it was still a voluntary decision.

From the Washington Post article where I'm getting all this:

In spite of his new, fresher scent, Bailey doesn't support a blanket smoking ban for Washington's bars and clubs. "I'm glad I was able to make my own decision about this," he says.

I love hearing this. As a non-smoker, I've always been selfishly in favor of a smoking ban, but there's a bigger part of me that hates to see decisions like that made by laws. If there's a market for smoke-free restaurants and bars, then people will make the decision themselves to open those places. I just hate to see that decision made by lawmakers. Let the people decide, which, in this case, they have.

Meaning and saying

This was predictable:

Cheney Softens Comments on Kerry and Terror Threat

Like we couldn't all see it coming from miles away.

I don't believe for a second that Dick Cheney didn't know exactly what he was saying. This is a political tactic that seems to be becoming more popular, and it works. You say something that plants a seed in people's minds (especially if it's a fear seed) and then come out and say later that, no, they were misquoted. It has two good effects: one, it allows candidates to essentially slander their opponents while also a) blaming the media for misquoting them and b) making anyone who was upset by the initial comment feel dumb for misunderstanding and two, it allows them to stretch out the point by making one issue and turning it into two stories: the initial comment and the clarification.

Since getting into office, I'll give every amount of credit to the Bush administration for realizing that, as Republicans, they can get away with stuff that makes the Democrats look like lying weasels. Cheney has now made front-page headlines twice, and both times, has made sure that undecided voters and all Republicans question whether they would *really* be safe with John Kerry in office. You've gotta hand it to them: they're clever.

It still seems a little risky, though. Doesn't it take only a slight bit of effort to piece together that Richard Clark resigned over the Bush Administration's poor handling of terrorism, and that it's possible that the cutbacks and lack of attention to issues of terrorism were partly to blame for the 9/11 attacks? Well, it does take a slight bit of effort, but that still seems more than a lot of people are willing to give it. No, it's true: we'll all die with Kerry at the helm. Better to know that you're not safe than wonder if you're not safe? I don't even know anymore...

Not so swift

I'm a little amazed lately at how Republicans and undecided voters don't really seem to be able to add 2+2.

First, the swift boat debacle. It goes without saying that this is a despicable bit of mudslinging, but I finally saw one of the ads that showed some of Kerry's criticisms to congress of the American military in Vietnam. At every quote they put up on the screen, I thought, "What's wrong with this?" What's wrong with pointing out that the military behaved in ways that they shouldn't in Vietnam? Why should he stay quiet about it? Don't we expect our military to be decent citizens and not terrorize the innocent civilians of the country that they're occupying? Kerry was a whistle-blower. I don't have a problem with anything he said.

Then there's the fact that, in every poll I've seen, the public says that they trust Bush more on the war on terror, but don't trust him on Iraq. How are these two things not related?! People trust him on the war on terror even though he pulled troops out of Afghanistan before capturing Osama Bin Laden (which he still hasn't done), before completely stopping Al Queda, and then occupies a Muslim country that had no ties to Al Queda and was not immediate threat the the US, and turns it into a place where Muslim fundamentalism is now free to run rampant. How is that helping the war on terror?

Ladies and gentlemen...I implore you.

The right's double-standard monster roars again

This morning, thanks to the miracle of closed captioning and enough curiosity to not change the channel from Fox news in the gym this morning, I caught part of what looked like a painful debate between Janeanne Garafolo (who, politically speaking, I'm not a big fan of) and Sean Hannity (an evil little man). After the clip, they moved back to the Fox morning anchors who made some sarcastic comment (I could even tell it was sarcastic from the closed captioning) like, "That's great that we're getting political commentary from a comedian. A comedian."

This from the right, a people who worship an actor president. Do comedians, actors and musicians give up their right to political commentary because of their entertainer status? I wonder what they'd think of Dennis Miller mentioning multiple times on the Today show this morning that he hopes Kerry doesn't win and that he's voting for Bush. I doubt they'd mind.

On a slightly separate note, I think my vote is back with Kerry, as I was very impressed with his speech last night. I reserve the right to change my mind if those red-shirted devils come out again.

The kids in red are making me red and giving me the blues

For the last two weeks, the corner of 19th and M has been overrun with over-enthusiastic recent college grad-aged kids in red DNC shirts, asking everyone who walks by, "Would you like to help get George Bush out of the White House?" They're making my life miserable. I can't go get lunch or buy a CD or get an ill-advised caramel apple muffin without being asked if I would like to help get George Bush out of the White House. I live in constant annoyance of them. I walked a block out of my way just to avoid them.

I think it's a bad question to be asking. I know they think that they're trying to capitalize on Bush's increasing unpopularity, but I think that focusing on getting Bush out of the White House rather than getting Kerry in is a really flawed tactic. Sooner or later, undecided voters are going to compare and contrast the two, and if the DNC's tactic has just been "Bush bad", then people are going to eventually going to ask, "But what's good, then?" It's been conventional political wisdom for a very long time: don't give voters a choice between an known evil and an unknown, especially if "evil" is still leading in the polls.

But even besides the flawed politics, they're just annoying, and they don't have to be. One or two days of it, fine. But they've been there for TWO WEEKS. I've never voted for anyone but Democrats in my entire voting career and if they're pissing me off, I can't imagine how irritated the undecided voters and questioning Republicans in this neighborhood are getting. All they have to do is make sure they're not in one spot for longer than two or three days and then move on (Ha! Get it?! Move on?!) to another street corner. They're driving me crazy and they need to leave.

For a while, I joked that I was going to respond, "If you ask me one more time, I'm voting for George Bush." But they've annoyed me enough that I don't think I'll be voting for Kerry. While something really catastrophic would have to happen for me to even consider voting for Bush, these little campaigners have made my vote almost definite: I'm voting for Nader.

Ralph Nader stands in the way of entertainment

This is (one of the reasons) why I love living in DC: I decide to take a break last night from rearranging my bedroom (had to be done) by going over to the Borders near my house, only to find that the way to the DVD section is blocked by folks listening to Ralph Nader. Only in DC! Well, I guess it's anywhere that he's talking, which is probably a lot of places. But still...it seems very DC to go into your local bookstore and find a presidential candidate.

I was really impressed by the things he had to say. It's a shame that he's not the Democratic candidate. Now, granted, when you're sitting listening to one person's rhetoric, it's pretty difficult not to be at least a little swayed, and swayed I was. I don't believe that the gap between Kerry and Bush is as small as he believes, but I thought that he had some great points about how the Democrats have screwed themselves in recent elections, and it was pretty sobering to think that the way both parties approach corporations and work issues really aren't very different.

There were a couple of near-crackpot statements, such as what he would have done about terrorism, but he had a great point when he said the he had worked for years to get cockpit doors more secure and locked, but without a tragedy, no one would bother even thinking about it.

Plus, there were some hecklers, which make any public event worthwhile.

If you're wondering why I haven't updated in so long, I believe the quality of this post goes a long way to answering that.

The way I grew up thinking

A news article in Salon this morning on Nader voters really disturbed me, but probably not for the same reason as everyone else. This bit sends chills up my spine:

Pat Lister, 44, of Des Plains, Ill., recently lost her job as a data-entry clerk and her husband has been unemployed for two years. "Dan and I very much are far worse off than four years ago,'' she said. "We need a change and it better come quick.''

But she's been a Republican since the cradle.

"Republicans, good, and Democrats are bad, is the way I grew up thinking,'' she said. "That darn upbringing is what haunts me.''

She said she would feel disloyal abandoning the GOP for the Democrats, "but if I voted for Nader I won't feel so bad about it.''

There are, of course, plenty of Democrats who could never vote for Republicans, but this woman's viewpoint is one that's been shared by more and more people in the last fifteen years or so, and it's something that reaches beyond just simple party (or even political) loyalty; it's outright blind following of propaganda. Conservatives and Republicans have done a fantastic job making people believe that Democrats an evil, society-destroying scourge, who'll raise your taxes until you're poor, dismantle the entire military, will make all of your children gay and abort all pregnancies by law.

Okay, the second two are exaggerations, but the first two aren't. There are a large number of otherwise reasonable, rational people who see voting Democrat as a sure road to financial ruin and military weakness. These people are Bush's strongest ally, because he knows that he can do whatever he wants, screw up whatever he wants, and those people will still vote for him, only because they can't face voting Democrat.

The worst part about the quote above is how unbelievably stupid it is, and how much it says, in a deeper sense, about blind prejudice towards large groups of people. This woman hates Democrats so much that she'll vote for a candidate who's so liberal that he won't even align himself with the Democrats, and she'll run the risk of ending up with the same economic situation that she has now. Genius.

Open up for some words

Have you heard about the one where the Bush administration made a video segment about the benefits of the new medicare legislation and then sent it out to local news stations, hoping that those stations pressed for time, would air it as is as news? No? It's hilarious.

And it got me thinking. I've spent my whole life putting a decent amount of effort into being a good, nice person and then just hoping that the people I come in contact with will think I'm a good, nice person and will pass that information on to others.

Did you hear that?! Hoping?! Hope is no way to live!! What a sucker I've been! For all I know, the people I know haven't even been talking about me when I'm not there. Even worse, they have conversations about me that lead them to the conclusion that I'm an asshole, and it's likely that these conversations happen simply because they can't think of anything else to talk about. Gives you a shudder, doesn't it?

I'm done with that. From now on, I'm not going to rely on other people to make their own decisions about me. I have to take matters into my own hands.

So, as a suggestion totally unrelated to anything I wrote above, please memorize the following facts about me and use them whenever there's a lull in the conversation:

"Well, here's a lull in the conversation. I guess we could talk about politics, but then we'd just get into some tense conversation about what's right or wrong. It must be incredibly convenient to be someone like Reid whose sense of right or wrong is perfect. Regardless of how strong you might think your convictions are, even a short conversation with Reid will make you at least question your previously-strong beliefs. He really is amazing that way. And so many others."

"It's supposed to get hot soon. Speaking of hot, have you noticed how hot Reid is? You may have thought of him before as plain, if not ugly, but take a look at him again, and if you're sophisticated enough, it'll suddenly hit you just how what a handsome, manly slice of hot he is. It's like those visual illusion pictures, where you think it's just a bunch of ink spots, but then it hits you that it's actually a cow, and then you can never see it as anything but a cow again."

"I was thinking the other day just how hard it is to know what's good music and what's bad music. Making that distinction between the two is something that's nearly impossible for your average music listener. The only real way to be able to tell the difference between the two is to have an incredibly heightened musical sense, like Reid. It'd be impossible for your average music listener to refine his or her musical tastes to the level of Reid, but at least we know we can look to him for the absolute bottom line on musical issues."

These should get you started. Check back for more later.

Do you swear to uphold the constitution and ask, "Dude...you gonna eat that?"

As a nation, we've been voting for president for about 220 years now, and yet there still seems to be a lot of confusion as to just what we're voting for. An email going around is delivering the shocking news that John Kerry is kind of an inconsiderate jerk.

Ladies and gentlemen, I just don't care. I've said this many times since the '96 election: I'm not voting for the nicest guy. I don't cast my vote for who I would most want to sit down to a nice dinner with. I vote based on politics. Bob Dole seems like an extremely nice person, but he's an extremely nice guy who is anti-choice, anti-gun control, and in favor of tax cuts for the rich, among other things. Same goes with Bush. Why should I care if these guys are really good fathers and devoted husbands if they're not legislating the way I want them to legislate? Why should I care if Clinton and Kerry are jerks as long as they vote the way I want them to vote? W's purportedly easy, laid-back, caring attitude doesn't affect me in my everyday life, but his apparent disdain for the first amendment does.

Is this so hard to understand? On the surface, it seems to be, as we watch nervous conservatives get shocked over the private-life personality of a guy they weren't going to vote for anyway. But deeper down, we know what it is: just another conservative attempt to get moderates to forget about politics (which they seem to do pretty easily) and vote based only on personality.

But the story of the Pilot & the Pizza is the most ridiculous yet. As Barbara Mikkelson points out on that page on Snopes, it could just be a matter of John Kerry being kind of dense and not seeing how his actions affect other people, not that he considers himself above others. But even if he does consider himself above others, I'm still voting solely on politics, even if an old college roommate comes forward with a horrifying story of how John Kerry once finished off the milk even though his roommate's name was clearly written on it.

Look at the size of that 'I voted!' sticker!!

I voted for Kucinich. Go ahead and let that sink in. It's okay...no one's really believed me the first time I told them, and when I saw the 1% by his name for the Virginia primary results, I kind of couldn't believe it myself.

And until this morning, I didn't think I could do it, mostly because I had the best reason in the world not to vote for Dennis Kucinich: spite. The best part is, I was spiting an online poll, specifically the AOL poll that was floating around that asked you a bunch of questions and then matched you up with a candidate. So I answered the questions and my result was a 100% match with Kucinich, which pissed me off because I figured it was a lazy survey, just figuring, "Ohhhh, I get it. You've answered a couple of questions that make us see that you're just a liberal. Why don't you just vote for the liberal then, you freaky liberal?!"

I figured I'd go with Edwards or Clark. I knew Kerry was going to win, so I realized that I could just vote for the person whose politics I most agreed with, not just for the person who I thought would do the best job as president (and yes, I do think those two things are different). So this morning, I used the nice little Flash app that some programmer at the Washington Post put together that compares and contrasts the politics of each candidate, reckoning that I'd be able to figure out whether I matched up better with Edwards or Clark. But I realized that, issue-for-issue, it was Kucinich that I agreed with most. Now, I wouldn't feel comfortable with someone as liberal as Kucinich as president, and I really disagree that we should pull out US troops from Iraq (you can't make a mess and then just leave without cleaning it up), but this was a good chance to vote for issues and nothing else and know that it didn't make a damn bit of difference to anyone anywhere. Anyone but me, and who matters more? Exactly.

Just take a second out of your busy day to imagine my sense of satisfaction when I saw that little American flag waving on a computer screen, knowing I'd just voted. Oh, I got a sticker, too.