sweetheart-mine

Good news: we have rectified that situation.

well i would hope so. that was a crime!

I'm not sure I like your tone.

as a slob whose money is all scrunched up in little bunches going every which way, i found it baffling. i like consistent slobdom.

My obsession stems from when I worked in the cash office at a grocery store. I had to count all of the tills and do the bank deposit and all that. I made sure all of the cashiers put their money in right because I was sick of it going every which way. It's a lot faster to count money (by hand) when it's all going the same direction. If you're counting a stack of $20 bills, it's easier to see if a $10 or something was mixed in because you'd immediately notice the difference.

that makes perfect sense.

I know Obama believes in Defense but I am guessing, hoping, assuming his war expenditures will be less than Bush's.

they'd better be. i'm guessing they will be.

You know, sometimes things have to get worse before they get better. If the economy really rock bottoms, or an ice cap disappears you'll see some

real impetus for change.

this is true, and i agree likely to foster bigger and faster change than anything else -- though "faster" is always relative. it's why i've never posted laments about gas prices or the economy. hard as those things are on lots of people (including my middle-class-at-best household), in the big picture they or related issues will make daily-life changes necessary and in the process straighten out some really screwed-up materialistic priorities.

I don't buy it, sorry. We're fucking the world up by such leaps and bounds that we need a far

larger emergency brake than provided by a change in president. It's a good start but not

nearly enough.

we actually agree on quite a lot. what is the alternative to a good start? i think a good start is better than nothing -- or, worse, a deeper dive into the morasses of neocon territory.

I don't think our present system can address the kind of social change I think necessary for the long term survival and safety of the majority of the earth's people and resources. I certainly don't think it can address political reform, as to get to that level these folks need to sell their souls (sorry Maker). So yeah, I'm of the revolution ilk. I'd get going on but I'm not prepared to get arrested until my kid is emancipated.

no one is ever prepared for one reason or another (probably most of them valid). that is why, though i'd love to see a revolutionary overhaul of our political & governmental systems and consider myself pretty far left of democrat or liberal -- as you sound, at least in this post -- i've learned that, at least for myself, my first responsibility is to vote in the candidate most likely to do the most good, nationwide but especially worldwide.

. . . I think the country would be in equally bad shape, perhaps somewhat different but still bad, had we dealt with Gore or Bush.

never to be proven otherwise, of course, but i think that is rash-generalization b.s.

edit: p.s. would the world be in equally bad shape in terms of our effects on it? no way.

Not if you don't omit the "did not vote because lynched" category in the polling then.

exactly.

Do you really think our system is working? I don't. We need whole scale election reform. Yes, the president is irrelevant to that goal. The party in power never wants reform because they have the upper hand in that regard.

no. i don't think our system is working. that will, realistically, be addressed not by revolution but by evolution, beginning with election of presidents and congresspeople who get it drummed into their skulls by the people who elected them that reform is a must -- or they're out on their butts. if you have a better start in mind, have at it. if the president isn't involved either hands-on or by example, at least for starters, who do you see as leaders in this reform movement? let me know, because i'd like to have a word with them.

Trying to get right with the rest of the world can't happen soon enough.

 

Those of use who remember the civil rights movement (not must reading about it in a book) are amazed that within our life span a person of color is actually maybe going to be president of the USA. Within my lifetime blacks were discouaged from voting, much less win elected office and certainly not President. On this point alone this is an historic election...

 

LouieB

yes. amazed. never thought we'd see it. as recently as the 1960s there were exactly two streets in my n.y. state town where the "negros" lived when i was in junior high school -- Lincoln Street and Washington Street. that was it. and no mixing!

I'm not sure how people don't see this election as more important than most. The past 8 years have derailed the country. Getting back on track is going to be slow but the two parties have vastly different ideas on how to get there - the war, the economic policy, taxes, international relations, etc. This one sure seems important.

 

Further, assuming the Republicans lose, to have them go back to the drawing board and move away from the extremist ideas of the past 8 years would be yet another beneficial outcome.

 

This election is a bit more important than the last one as we have better candidates and the country is in even worse shape than 2004.

you got it, in my opinion.

I don't think any of that elevates this election over any other or the next one. If anything I think they grow less important until there is some reform in place to clean up the process and take our the influence of lobbyists.

how do you think the influence of lobbyists will be removed? do you think whoever is president is completely irrelevant to that goal?

We're about to elect a person of color to the white house. Seeing that that actually happens certainly is bringing out people who might not vote otherwise. Social change is a pretty good motivator. Also the economy is kind of in the tank. There are going to be a lot if disappointed people when the economy isn't fixed 6 or 9 months into Obama's first term.

yes, of course to your first sentence -- that was certainly included in my idea of consequential. i'm not sure why you would have thought otherwise. i'm not color-blind like, say, stephen colbert. i think people also see other social-change possibilities under obama, which is as you say a motivator to vote. yes, the economy is in the tank. i guess i still don't get the implication of your "for real," but never mind.

without doubt there will be a lot of disappointed people when obama can't fix their personal problems in his first year, or maybe ever. that will happen, no question. i'm still not sure of your point. i'm voting for obama because i think he will be good for the country in general and in some specific ways, and, maybe more important, for the world and our relations with it.

for real?

what do you think? because it's just fun to vote? or they expect to have nothing better to do on election day? "for real," what do you figure?

C'mon sweetheart - they do. We hear "this crucial point in history" and stuff like that ad nauseum every single election cycle. I feel personally that this election is up there, history-wise, but it's not really unique in that way.

no one has taken this country down a radical, extremist path in several decades as the bush administration has. i've never before seen anything like the gap between what the parties are offering now. and if this election isn't seen as more consequential than others in the recent past, why are so many people rushing to register and to vote? it isn't just because of the obama campaign's efforts to register people. mccain people are doing it in larger numbers also. every other election i can think of was either medium-interesting or ho-hum to almost everyone, from friends and neighbors to media and politicians, compared to now.

That's what they say about every election.

no, they don't.

and after the last eight years, i see this election as more crucial -- on the world scale -- than any other in my lifetime.

edit: i haven't seen any hate from you personally -- in fact, not from many on this board, no matter what their political preference.

I've seen alot more hate for the right spewed than vice versa.

um, maybe because of the last eight years? but i don't think it's hate. i hear and read more actual hate from the right, and frustration, disgust, and fear

from the left.

why do people need their cash all facing the same way and in order even if they're slobs in every other way?

I voted!

 

 

(can I be excused from this thread now? )

 

 

 

edit: just kidding, I'm still not going anywhere

you'd better not!

I started to get the feeling that the campaign excitement is going lead us to a huge let down once it is decided. We won't have all the campaign hoopla, we'll just be left with an enormous task of digging out of the hole we are in.

 

And holy dog crap, y'all seen the polls today. I was thinking Big 10 was wack but Quinnipiac is 2 pts. higher Big 10 poll in Ohio. Gaaawlyeee:

 

Ohio Big10 Battleground Obama 53, McCain 41 Obama +12

Pennsylvania Big10 Battleground Obama 52, McCain 41 Obama +11

Michigan Big10 Battleground Obama 58, McCain 36 Obama +22

Minnesota Big10 Battleground Obama 57, McCain 38 Obama +19

Wisconsin Big10 Battleground Obama 53, McCain 40 Obama +13

Iowa Big10 Battleground Obama 52, McCain 39 Obama +13

Indiana Big10 Battleground McCain 41, Obama 51 Obama +10

Illinois Big10 Battleground Obama 61, McCain 32 Obama +29

Pennsylvania Morning Call Obama 52, McCain 42 Obama +10

Ohio Quinnipiac Obama 52, McCain 38 Obama +14

Florida Quinnipiac Obama 49, McCain 44 Obama +5

Pennsylvania Quinnipiac Obama 53, McCain 40 Obama +13

California PPIC Obama 56, McCain 33 Obama +23

you just made my day.

I met Rich Whitney and a bunch of the IL Green's through my daughter (formerly Tweedys Gurl) one night and it was facinating as well. I am not much of an organizational persion, although I have spent much of my life attending meetings. This was a social gathering and it was as you describe, people who consider themselves outsiders and odd balls. Whitney's wife kept expressing opinions that she kept acting like she was the only one who had them, when in fact they were pretty common leftish opinions and not that unusual. In order to put together an IL slate of candidates (by this time the election was long over) they apparently took all comers, which included at least one person they couldn't stand and apparently didn't agree with for one state office.

 

For me this entire third party thing (I am particularly disappointed with Nader who I think is a jerk...) has little to do with organizing to get unmet governmental needs met and more about self agrandizement. The newest New Yorker has several interesting articles about Nader and the Bob Bart running for president with the Libertarians (he was a very conservative Republican initially.) We really need to go back to the earliest part of the 20th century to find real third parties that made any difference (I keep mentioning Debs since he got a million votes while in jail.....history buffs can chime in on this...).

 

If I am cranky about anything (as myboyblue has accused me of...) it is clearly that I think people want to find fault with Barack so they can justify voting for some wacko third party and totally waste there vote (and maybe put Sarah Palin in the White House...) rather than understand how unique a moment this is.

 

My story about visiting Trinity UCC Church this past week has been largely ignored, but I have to tell you it is very moving sitting and talking with African Americans (even these folks who could be really pissed off at Barack for dissing his former church), but actually they also know this is an historic election and that this is the time. For some of us here not to recognize that and bad mouth Barack only proves that some folks (like members of the Green Party) can't see beyond the end of their noses (an expression my mother used to use...). Sure I would like to vote Socialist or Workers Party or some such entity that may represent more closely my personal ideology than the Democrats do, but they don't exist and they haven't existed in my lifetime. So we need to support the party closest to our basic philosophy and support it to the exent we feel able and certainly give it the only thing they really ask for, our vote, not waste another opportunity and end up with another Bush, McCain, Palin to suffer through again...

 

LouieB

well, i understand this, i really do. i'm an idealist who has learned over many elections to vote as a realist -- with the hardest lesson being my vote for nader in 2000 (who i agree has turned out to be a jerk). i'm sure i was half thinking "what's the difference." we've certainly learned the difference, and it was gigantic. although not particularly a gore fan, i'm pretty sure that, had the court awarded the election to gore, we would not have invaded and occupied iraq, most of the rest of the world would still respect us, there wouldn't have been "gore tax cuts for the wealthy," and we'd be way farther along on climate-change/energy issues. i will never waste my vote again. there are plenty of other ways to express my ideals and work toward them, including actively protesting & pushing democrats to do the right thing when cowardice sets in, as we've seen all too often these past eight years. (now and then that actually works, i've learned firsthand.)

did the people you met with at trinity express any upset (or lingering upset) at all with obama for leaving or for anything he said? or did they just get right over it and move on because they realized, as you say, that this is truly a unique moment? and what work do you do, if you don't mind saying?

QUOTE (sweetheart-mine @ Oct 23 2008, 09:21 AM) *

my first vote went to mcgovern in 1972. wow, was that a sorry night in my apartment. crybaby.gif drinkingbeer.gif frusty.gif

 

 

Were you in MA by chance? At least you would've had company.

no, in albany n.y., having just moved into my first apartment after college. it was a genuine thrill to pull the lever that day, for the first time . . . now i usually go to vote with huge anxiety! haven't had too many lucky election nights.

my first vote went to mcgovern in 1972. wow, was that a sorry night in my apartment.

Geebus....how freaking old are you?

who? i just turned 154 last week.