So There You Have It

I feel compelled, for completeness if nothing else, to write something now that the election is over, but to tell the truth… at this point I really don’t give a rat’s ass. Miracles aside, the election is over and Bush won. I’ve made my opinions quite clear. My opinions have not carried the day. Oh well. So here are my final thoughts on this election, and they are unashamedly bitter:

America has once again proven that despite its status as the world’s only (for now…) military superpower, it remains politically basically a backwater. Faith trumps thought. Vague, undefined “moral values” trump civil rights. Imperial ambitions trump alliance-building, Evangelical Christians trump the “melting pot”. Homogenous, rural, xenophobic, white America trumps heterogeneous, urban, liberal, multi-cultural America. Shoot… you can see it on the map: county-by county, with only a few exceptions, Kerry took the cities, Bush took everything else. http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/vote2004/countymap.htm.

So there you have it. Compassionate Conservatism has served its purpose - to make radicals seem moderate. That cover will be the first thing to go in January... The neo-cons get to strut their stuff another 4 years. The Evangelical’s get to re-make most key American institutions in their image. The voter’s get what they wanted, and probably what they deserve. In particular they get their wish to be ruled by people with unwavering conviction of the Rightness of their Cause. Careful what you wish for… you might get it. It's an interesting model, but sadly one that has been tried, and found wanting, a thousand times throughout history.

You know, maybe it’s a model developed by spending too much time driving across Texas… in the middle of the prairie, if you drive in a straight line you can get clear across the State… Even if, say, the road drifts a little to the left all that happens is you end up in a ditch covered in cow poop. But America doesn’t live on the plains, it lives in the mountains and a nasty winter storm is raging. If the road makes a hairpin right turn, that Texan will smash through the guardrail and fly off a cliff...

So let’s, for an instant, drop the analogies and be clear to all those rural “moral values” voters who think Bush is so clever: while you all were voting to keep gays unmarried, we were voting for our lives. When Al Qaida detonates a dirty bomb in a shipping container it’s Kerry voters who will die. You f***ers better have made the right call.

The driver has taken the wheel and is about to step on the gas. Let’s hope that THIS TIME he keeps his eyes on the road.