The Good, The Bad, The Ugly
Nov. 5th, 2008 10:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gonzaiFirst off, I admit it. I'm a wimp. Getting up early for voting meant not staying up late for the returns. I conked out around 10ish, just couldn't hang in there. So, here's a big pile'o'thoughts on the election results.
The Good:
Wow. Just, wow. I may have gone to bed early but I already knew, because of the West Coast votes, that Obama had won. And the first thing I heard in the morning was the dulcet tones of Carl Kassel on NPR, telling me we'd elected our first black President. The DJ followed up by playing John Lennon's 'Imagine', which moved me to tears of course, and then Joan Osborne's 'Cathedrals'. Would someone please, please, PLEASE vid that song? I'm thinking West Wing, maybe some 24 or new Galactica, perhaps some Obama footage. It HAS to be done, seriously. Also happy with Colorado, and the various abortion initiatives that were shot down and the marijuana and euthanasia initiatives that were approved.
The Bad:
Then I read the paper/turned on the computer. And commenced banging my head against the wall. Gambling was legalized in Maryland (I voted against it.) The affirmative action initiatives. Florida, Arkansas, Arizona. McGann/McCarthy keeps her seat in Minnesota. Mark Pryor keeps his seat in the Senate (if you've seen 'Religulous', you know what I mean.) Oh yeah, and my mother broke one of the precinct voting machines. It's a touch-screen thing that validates votes with a credit-card type doohickey; instead of putting it in the slot where the poll volunteers told her to, she decided to just slide it into the first slot-like thing she found. She shorted out the whole machine. Gack.
And the Ugly.
California and Proposition 8. Florida too. How people can be progressive and optimistic and forward-thinking enough to vote for Obama, then go down a couple spaces and vote for something so backwards and hateful? I don't understand. I truly don't. I woke up so happy this morning and almost instantly I'm deflated back to zero. Depressing.
There's also the who knows category - the Maryland 1st District, barely a quarter mile from my house (I live in the 2nd). First, let me state outright that I despise Andy Harris. A carpet-bagging, party-switching, hateful opportunist. I wish I could have voted against him. Apparently a lot of people felt that way; with the regular vote counted but not the absentees/provisionals, he is losing to Frank Kratovil by less than a thousand votes. Meep. And Harris is exactly the sort of 'person' who will demand multiple recounts, challenge every vote and sue at every level until either he's declared the winner or the Supreme Court tells him to bug off. Buckle up kids, we're going for a ride.
The Good:
Wow. Just, wow. I may have gone to bed early but I already knew, because of the West Coast votes, that Obama had won. And the first thing I heard in the morning was the dulcet tones of Carl Kassel on NPR, telling me we'd elected our first black President. The DJ followed up by playing John Lennon's 'Imagine', which moved me to tears of course, and then Joan Osborne's 'Cathedrals'. Would someone please, please, PLEASE vid that song? I'm thinking West Wing, maybe some 24 or new Galactica, perhaps some Obama footage. It HAS to be done, seriously. Also happy with Colorado, and the various abortion initiatives that were shot down and the marijuana and euthanasia initiatives that were approved.
The Bad:
Then I read the paper/turned on the computer. And commenced banging my head against the wall. Gambling was legalized in Maryland (I voted against it.) The affirmative action initiatives. Florida, Arkansas, Arizona. McGann/McCarthy keeps her seat in Minnesota. Mark Pryor keeps his seat in the Senate (if you've seen 'Religulous', you know what I mean.) Oh yeah, and my mother broke one of the precinct voting machines. It's a touch-screen thing that validates votes with a credit-card type doohickey; instead of putting it in the slot where the poll volunteers told her to, she decided to just slide it into the first slot-like thing she found. She shorted out the whole machine. Gack.
And the Ugly.
California and Proposition 8. Florida too. How people can be progressive and optimistic and forward-thinking enough to vote for Obama, then go down a couple spaces and vote for something so backwards and hateful? I don't understand. I truly don't. I woke up so happy this morning and almost instantly I'm deflated back to zero. Depressing.
There's also the who knows category - the Maryland 1st District, barely a quarter mile from my house (I live in the 2nd). First, let me state outright that I despise Andy Harris. A carpet-bagging, party-switching, hateful opportunist. I wish I could have voted against him. Apparently a lot of people felt that way; with the regular vote counted but not the absentees/provisionals, he is losing to Frank Kratovil by less than a thousand votes. Meep. And Harris is exactly the sort of 'person' who will demand multiple recounts, challenge every vote and sue at every level until either he's declared the winner or the Supreme Court tells him to bug off. Buckle up kids, we're going for a ride.
