clever subject here
Nov. 3rd, 2004 10:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7Mmf. (little noise of misery)
I'm sober and over my Tourette's (apologies to everyone on my flist for last night. !!!!), but feeling progressively worse and worse between the ribs.
There's a reason I never read or watch the news. I rely entirely on my friends' list and on Dave's comments to know what's going on in the world. And it's way better that way.
I tried to catch up on sleep this morning, but Dave had to get up and go watch chemistry videos at his mom's house, and that involved 45 full minutes of tramping around the house in shoes. And once I had woken, I was upset over the election again.
I've been thinking it over and I think what makes me the most unhappy is that almost 50% of us are losers now, and there is absolutely no provision to take us into account in the governance of the country. Last time Bush was elected, even though he had less of the popular vote, he took his election as though it were a mandate from the masses, and set about proudly running the country as though there were a consensus behind him, with no accounting at all for the fact that fully half of the country disagreed strongly with him.
And now, if he wins, we can add in the fact that his party once again controls the Senate.
But by no means are the Republicans in the clear majority of voters. Everywhere the margins of victory were razor-thin.
So if he wins, 48-49% of the active, voting citizens are people who have been actively opposed to him.
And there is nothing in our government that is accountable to these people. Unprecedented numbers of people voted: all that means is that unprecedented numbers of people will have to wait another 4 years (2 years, I guess, for Congress) before their voices can legitimately be heard at all.
What is needed at this point is for whoever wins to set about healing the divisions within the country.
Much of my major distress at Bush's likely victory stems from the fact that I have no reason whatsoever to believe that he will recognize that, and do anything about it. He has a history of only pleasing those that he needs to please, and having no interest in any small groups except the ones that, and I'm trying to put this diplomatically, control significant amounts of money and who either owe him favors or he owes favors. That didn't come out as detachedly as I was hoping, as I'm trying to approach this as neutrally as I can, but it's hard when you feel so squicky about it all.
Not that I know Kerry would have done anything at all to accomodate the nearly half (or, as it turns out, more than half, but had he won the numbers would need to be different) of Americans who voted against him, most quite passionately. I really don't know what would happen if he won. I preferred him because I felt less threatened by his vision-- Bush just feels so dangerously arrogant to me, and keeps making such astonishingly wrong, to me, decisions. The rest of the world hates us, and he doesn't care. (His re-election website was blocked from overseas visitors. That's caring.)
I suppose for either to make concessions to the millions who oppose them would risk alienating their own constituents. Because we are so horribly polarized. I don't know why; the vast majority of humans are reasonable people with similar desires. But somehow, there is a deep split and nobody can be reasonable about this.
And when I first woke up and was thinking about this, I almost rolled over and typed an entry entitled SECEDE!!!! Yes, a self-proclaimed moderate.
And really, the Civil War was caused by the same sort of thing-- an incredibly polarizing issue deadlocked for generations and kept unresolved by endless compromise, until finally the compromisers could do no more and one side finally gained a slight numeric advantage in votes. The other side, knowing that they could now no longer maintain the deadlock at the ballot box, resorted to secession from the nation. And in the end, everyone felt so strongly over it that they slaughtered one another by the hundreds of thousands.
Mmmm, tastes like history. How long can the U.S. remain stable like this?
I'm sober and over my Tourette's (apologies to everyone on my flist for last night. !!!!), but feeling progressively worse and worse between the ribs.
There's a reason I never read or watch the news. I rely entirely on my friends' list and on Dave's comments to know what's going on in the world. And it's way better that way.
I tried to catch up on sleep this morning, but Dave had to get up and go watch chemistry videos at his mom's house, and that involved 45 full minutes of tramping around the house in shoes. And once I had woken, I was upset over the election again.
I've been thinking it over and I think what makes me the most unhappy is that almost 50% of us are losers now, and there is absolutely no provision to take us into account in the governance of the country. Last time Bush was elected, even though he had less of the popular vote, he took his election as though it were a mandate from the masses, and set about proudly running the country as though there were a consensus behind him, with no accounting at all for the fact that fully half of the country disagreed strongly with him.
And now, if he wins, we can add in the fact that his party once again controls the Senate.
But by no means are the Republicans in the clear majority of voters. Everywhere the margins of victory were razor-thin.
So if he wins, 48-49% of the active, voting citizens are people who have been actively opposed to him.
And there is nothing in our government that is accountable to these people. Unprecedented numbers of people voted: all that means is that unprecedented numbers of people will have to wait another 4 years (2 years, I guess, for Congress) before their voices can legitimately be heard at all.
What is needed at this point is for whoever wins to set about healing the divisions within the country.
Much of my major distress at Bush's likely victory stems from the fact that I have no reason whatsoever to believe that he will recognize that, and do anything about it. He has a history of only pleasing those that he needs to please, and having no interest in any small groups except the ones that, and I'm trying to put this diplomatically, control significant amounts of money and who either owe him favors or he owes favors. That didn't come out as detachedly as I was hoping, as I'm trying to approach this as neutrally as I can, but it's hard when you feel so squicky about it all.
Not that I know Kerry would have done anything at all to accomodate the nearly half (or, as it turns out, more than half, but had he won the numbers would need to be different) of Americans who voted against him, most quite passionately. I really don't know what would happen if he won. I preferred him because I felt less threatened by his vision-- Bush just feels so dangerously arrogant to me, and keeps making such astonishingly wrong, to me, decisions. The rest of the world hates us, and he doesn't care. (His re-election website was blocked from overseas visitors. That's caring.)
I suppose for either to make concessions to the millions who oppose them would risk alienating their own constituents. Because we are so horribly polarized. I don't know why; the vast majority of humans are reasonable people with similar desires. But somehow, there is a deep split and nobody can be reasonable about this.
And when I first woke up and was thinking about this, I almost rolled over and typed an entry entitled SECEDE!!!! Yes, a self-proclaimed moderate.
And really, the Civil War was caused by the same sort of thing-- an incredibly polarizing issue deadlocked for generations and kept unresolved by endless compromise, until finally the compromisers could do no more and one side finally gained a slight numeric advantage in votes. The other side, knowing that they could now no longer maintain the deadlock at the ballot box, resorted to secession from the nation. And in the end, everyone felt so strongly over it that they slaughtered one another by the hundreds of thousands.
Mmmm, tastes like history. How long can the U.S. remain stable like this?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-11-03 03:51 pm (UTC)I'm surprised at how much of this sentiment I'm seeing. (Surprised, because that was also my first reaction.)
no subject
Date: 2004-11-03 05:41 pm (UTC)We have tried our hardest to make change the legitimate way, and we were out-voted by people who (I firmly believe) did not make their choices as carefully as we did. The overwhelming feeling among Kerry supporters is that most of Bush's supporters voted for him without clearly understanding his positions. I know I feel that way very strongly.
And so we are all extremely disillusioned with the democratic process and with our neighbors, whose ignorance (we feel) made it not work.
And so, fed up, we are all naturally feeling that the legitimate processes aren't working at all and we are out of solutions.
I don't know how long the feeling will last, but I hope not long, because I don't like it. I hve seen the sentiment expressed, in response to many Kerry supporters wailing that they're running off to Canada, that we mustn't do that, we must stay so that we can effect change when our time comes again. But the exasperation remains-- we just did, and the forces of ignorance and fear defeated us.
So, it's normal, but that doesn't make it any less distressing.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-03 11:13 pm (UTC)I admit that I have times when I think this is better - and times I subscribe to this for short periods of time, even - but its not, in the end. How does that go - believe none of what you hear and half of what you read? That I do believe. Do your homework - and pick several sources of information to learn from. Pick something that leans liberal and something that leans conservative. Ask hard questions - who is going to raise taxes? How much? Who benefits? How do you hold the spenders of these new taxes accountable? Ask it on every issue.
Better yet, I have learned to go to the source of the information. CNN published something showing how farfetched the political claims were about lost jobs and taxes and the war - and it was true - we should have beleived none of what we heard.
And the US will survive. Keep your chin up :-)
no subject
Date: 2004-11-04 03:02 pm (UTC)I'm not sure which side you're saying was farfetched with their "political claims"; I don't know which parts of what we heard we were meant to believe, and I am always skeptical of stories by the media about how the media were wrong. Sure, I'll believe you when you say you lied. LOL.
But I don't watch television and don't listen to the radio, not owning either (I might have a radio somewhere but don't know what stations there are). So I rely on the Internet.
And when I'm up on the news, I'm depressed. When I'm not, I'm generally happier. That's all i meant by my comment about the news. I do tend to use multiple sources if I'm using any, but for the most part, I just let Dave read through Google News every morning and he sends me links to the stories I have to read.
The US has survived a great deal. I am not overly fussed by the reactionary conservative legislation. I've discovered that there are as many reasons for the rest of us to freak out over this as there are the rest of us freaking out over this. Friends of mine think it's the end of the world that a conservative-dominated government is going to be enacting legislation that crushes their rights; I'm not so fussed about that. We've undergone worse in the past and will doubtless survive and overcome it-- if we are spared that long.
It just strikes me as EXTREMELY distressing that so many people decided that the best thing to do for national security was to elect a candidate that the rest of the world hates so much that there's danger that they'll agree with Osama bin Laden's last tape. (And you know, just because a madman uses someone else's reasonable arguments doesn't mean that they're not reasonable arguments. He's still a madman; they're still reasonable arguments: their acquaintance doesn't change that.)
Hello. Let's paint a big freaking bullseye on ourselves. Over the top of the slightly smaller one that was already there. Whee!!
The US will survive, in one form or another, but how completely remains to be seen. Me, I'm building a bomb shelter in the basement.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-03 11:34 pm (UTC)I have to admit that, after feeling disenfranchised for the last 4 years, I can only woner what Bush will do now that he doesn't have the need to be re-elected hanging over him.
I'm with
no subject
Date: 2004-11-04 03:05 pm (UTC)So, if there's any redeeming merit in the man, there's a chance it may come out now!!
Talk about back-asswards hopefulness.
Excellent graphic. Yeah, I think NY would be more awexome if it were in Canada. Can we do that? Maybe if all the population centers became part of Canada instead of the US, then Canada could become the superpower instead. That'd be pretty freaking nifty.