US POLITICS: "I figured clueless was better than argumentative."

OK:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ElectoralCollege2008.svg

Politicians claim "mandates" all the time. The difference with Obama's victory is that he could legitimately claim one: the biggest Dem winner since LBJ.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ElectoralCollege2008.svg

voting is probably not going to kill you

Thanks for the opening, Milton. An Election Eve message from the dead:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIraCchPDhk

<3

"I'm sure that once the election is over, your country will improve immediately."

I can't be quite as curmudgeonly as George, but I wouldn't want to get caught trying to debate him on those points.

i don't think 08 can be described as "obama did not win as much as mccain lost" -- whoever grabbed the dem nomination had it basically in the bag. forgive me milton but this sounds like the kind of thing victor davis hanson and michael barone tell themselves.

anyway, i appreciate principled non-voting, i really do. but i don't do it. i just don't think principled voting occurs. like, when i pull the lever, it's not a stamp of blanket moral approval of everything that the powerful do for the remainder of their term. it's hardly a statment at all, just rather weak indication of preference: i'd rather this person hold that seat rather than some other person likely to get a majority. i understand that i am to feel implicated in this, somehow, morally, but i don't feel this way at all. i pulled the lever, and whatever they do next is on them.

i'll put it blutly: i know exactly to what degree this 'regime' has been bunglers or blunderers or cowards or miscalculators or over-calculators or just outright killers, i read the papers. but i'm going to get up tomorrow morning and vote for everyone i can find with a D next to their name, without regret, or a second look back, as i probably will do for the rest of my life.

i'm sure this is probably just as an infuriating decision to some as people advocating quietism or dropping out. i don't begrudge anyone their decision to do or not do anything politically. except vote for haley barbour, that guy looks like boss hogg and sounds like it too, come on.

/ I admit to overstating my case; the ratio was huge and the enthusiasm for obama was not an illusion

still, we owe many of the undecided votes simply to a pragmatic unwillingness to vote for mccain, and it's those people who have been targeted by the Tea Party. they'll be voting from the heart this time; it's our turn to be pragmatic.

Fuck the heart, seriously.

btw u guys are missin a helluva ballgame

they'll be voting from the heart this time; it's our turn to be pragmatic.

This means nothing. "The heart"? It's more like -- no, EXACTLY like -- the "gut" that Colbert talks about. Call me elitist, but Tea Partiers don't understand a thing about what they're voting for.

hm. 3 -- 0 giants in 7th.

Morbs otm again. There's little point in this particular conversation.

For those of you not voting for Democrats, do you live in states with ballot measures? and are you voting for them? Just curious. Ballot measures and candidates have always seemed like totally separate things to me, yet they are conflated together as "voting".

e.g. the marijuana initiatives in California and Oregon.

I've got eight amendments to our state constitution on which we're voting.

My district is a safe socially liberal Republican seat.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFSIcI0wmGw

for the record

For the record, Mo. went for McCain.

Tried to open all messages to read stuff from two hours ago and it practically crashed my browser (and, yes, I'm on a lame internet connection)

NEW THREAD, PLEASE

US POLITICS election/post-election edition: your country will improve immediately.