Vote or Die: Piecing together a few thoughts about today’s election …

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… mostly other people’s thoughts.

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Why other people’s thoughts? Because at this point, other than casting my own vote, there is nothing I can do to change an inevitably bad day for society, civilization, democracy, rational thought, and sanity.

I can hope that the day will not be as bad as it will, and there is indeed some evidence that this is possible.

5 Reasons Democrats Could Beat the Polls and Hold the House

A scenario like this one is possible tomorrow — not particularly likely, but possible — just as a 77-seat Republican gain is possible. It’s probably a somewhat greater possibility than people realize. Here are five reasons Democrats could outperform their polls and beat consensus expectations.*

They talk about the cellphone effect, the robopoll effect, thethiseffect and thethateffect. We’ll see.

Sometimes, when I feel like this, I go back and forth between not wanting them to “take” my country away, or that of my children, vs. thinking that they can have the stinking mess. Yesterday at the Gym I devised, in my mind, a set of slogans to print on T-shirts to wear at the gym. My blog is mostly for the converted, but my T-shirts are there to annoy them, as it is among them that I live these days. I want T-shirts that say “Tax the Rich” and “The Tea Party: Heternomrative, Recalcitrant, Addlepated, Pillaging Troglodytes with a Poor Vocabulary” and so on. I want to wear T-shirts that make bearded glassy eyed ruffians with mild fetal alcohol syndrome and bad teeth approach me in the parking lot outside to confront me with their blazingly inarticulate mealy mouthed mumbling. So I can slay them. Like by saying this:

I’m voting to take my country back from a movement that’s been in place for most of my lifetime. This movement has tried, and largely succeeded, in reversing the liberal policies that brought our country some of our most prosperous decades.

… which you can read here.

They have no clue what they are asking for, of what most of their words mean, or of how what they are saying is so utterly contradictory and absurd. Thomas Jefferson is spinning at Mach Two in his grave.

And what is most frustrating is that people who are disaffected, who feel that their progressive ideals have not been fully materialized in a 24 month time period and therefore someone must pay, will either do the stupidest thing in the world they can do (vote for the “other guy”) or the second stupidest thing they can do (not show up to vote at all). Because, really, if you have a memory that goes back as far as mine (which is remarkably far, comparing myself to the average voter … like ten years or so) Obama had been one of the better presidents we’ve had. (But I don’t expect you, if you are one of these other THEMS who would rather feel outrage than do the right thing, to read that because you don’t want to feel wrong even if the rest of us must pay for your arrogance.)

Do you want to know the Ugly Truth? Here is the Ugly Truth: If everybody who could vote did vote, the Democrats would hold the house and gain a seat or two in the senate.

This means that there is a non-trivial number of people who are worse than the teabaggers, worse than the “second amendment remedy” twits, and worse than any Republican. These are the people who want me and the rest of US to maintain the progressive movement while you are too busy changing the fucking toilet paper rolls in your house to vote.

OK, so I managed to get a couple of my own thoughts in there. But that is of no consequence. Just go vote. That is all that matters today.

Have you read the breakthrough novel of the year? When you are done with that, try:

In Search of Sungudogo by Greg Laden, now in Kindle or Paperback
*Please note:
Links to books and other items on this page and elsewhere on Greg Ladens' blog may send you to Amazon, where I am a registered affiliate. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, which helps to fund this site.

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5 thoughts on “Vote or Die: Piecing together a few thoughts about today’s election …

  1. I got an email from (my wife’s) niece that, unfortunately, sums up things from the other side. It was aimed at both me and my wife.

    “The way you base your voting decisions is wrong because you look at things you call ‘facts’ and ‘history’ when you make decisions. If you looked at what the people you support really feel in their heart and really want to do, you wouldn’t support them.”

    I think we’re correct to worry about what today’s results will bring us tomorrow.

  2. dean – the good news is, that with only one major grammatical error in two sentences, your niece (-in-law) is too articulate to succeed as a teabagger candidate.

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