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Election Results.
Nov. 3rd, 2004 09:21 amIt goes without saying that on the national level, I'm appalled. Never mind the presidential or even congressional races . . . the fact that every state that had an "I Hate Fags" amendment on its ballot passed it overwhelmingly indicates that there are entirely too many Americans who will wield whatever power they can to make their fellow Americans miserable. That makes me sadder than anything else. All of the other outcomes of the national races are a natural consequence of that impulse.
However, all is not without hope.
Kerry carried Minnesota handily. The Republican's majority in the state house no longer exists - it is now a tie with each party holding 67 seats. The Judicial races all went to the relatively liberal incumbents. In short, if this election can be viewed as a referendum on the Pawlenty administration, things do not bode well for Pawlenty in 2006. Our congressional delegation remains the same. I had hoped Patty Wetterling would have one in our adjacent district, but it was unsurprising that she didn't. Her platform was basically "I'm the mother of a missing child," and she seemed to have only a weak grasp of the issues, and her opponent, Mark Kennedy, trounced her pretty thoroughly in the debate. All in all, I'm pretty satisfied with the outcomes of the local elections.
So what next? I don't know. I'm tired of American politics. Sustained marketing blitzes and appeals to the basest, rather than the noblest, of emotions have become de rigeur. And those tactics are strong enough weapons that both sides must use them to engage a fair contest. But there are other issues too. Our democracy has essentially become a veil over a feudal, corporate oligarchic kleptocracy. The act of voting is a bone thrown to us, because really, when all is said and done, no matter which candidate wins, corporate feudalism remains our de facto government. And while I have some ideas how to fix that, they are neither very nice, nor very practicable, because they require a willingness to die that I don't think many Americans possess. I know I don't.
So if not fight, then flight? I've felt a tug toward Canada since I was around 9 years old. I used to root for the Blue Jays against the Yankees. I think that in Toronto I would find a city more suited to my temperament than Minneapolis/Saint Paul. Canada has made good on a social contract that America is most adamantly breaching. And I don't know that I've ever felt comfortable as an American - the Pledge of Allegiance made me uncomfortable the first time I uttered it in Kindergarten, and that discomfort never went away. Perhaps it's time to find a country I CAN care enough about to settle in.
It's just that overcoming the inertia is going to be a HUGE challenge. The prospect of such a move is overwhelming to me right now.
Oh, and Kerry just conceded. I won't hold it against him the way I held it against Gore, because the way the Congressional races turned out, he would not have had a snowball's chance in hell of actually governing. It would have been nothing but unrelenting grief for him much as it was for Clinton.
However, all is not without hope.
Kerry carried Minnesota handily. The Republican's majority in the state house no longer exists - it is now a tie with each party holding 67 seats. The Judicial races all went to the relatively liberal incumbents. In short, if this election can be viewed as a referendum on the Pawlenty administration, things do not bode well for Pawlenty in 2006. Our congressional delegation remains the same. I had hoped Patty Wetterling would have one in our adjacent district, but it was unsurprising that she didn't. Her platform was basically "I'm the mother of a missing child," and she seemed to have only a weak grasp of the issues, and her opponent, Mark Kennedy, trounced her pretty thoroughly in the debate. All in all, I'm pretty satisfied with the outcomes of the local elections.
So what next? I don't know. I'm tired of American politics. Sustained marketing blitzes and appeals to the basest, rather than the noblest, of emotions have become de rigeur. And those tactics are strong enough weapons that both sides must use them to engage a fair contest. But there are other issues too. Our democracy has essentially become a veil over a feudal, corporate oligarchic kleptocracy. The act of voting is a bone thrown to us, because really, when all is said and done, no matter which candidate wins, corporate feudalism remains our de facto government. And while I have some ideas how to fix that, they are neither very nice, nor very practicable, because they require a willingness to die that I don't think many Americans possess. I know I don't.
So if not fight, then flight? I've felt a tug toward Canada since I was around 9 years old. I used to root for the Blue Jays against the Yankees. I think that in Toronto I would find a city more suited to my temperament than Minneapolis/Saint Paul. Canada has made good on a social contract that America is most adamantly breaching. And I don't know that I've ever felt comfortable as an American - the Pledge of Allegiance made me uncomfortable the first time I uttered it in Kindergarten, and that discomfort never went away. Perhaps it's time to find a country I CAN care enough about to settle in.
It's just that overcoming the inertia is going to be a HUGE challenge. The prospect of such a move is overwhelming to me right now.
Oh, and Kerry just conceded. I won't hold it against him the way I held it against Gore, because the way the Congressional races turned out, he would not have had a snowball's chance in hell of actually governing. It would have been nothing but unrelenting grief for him much as it was for Clinton.
