Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

Some people are already making noises about this being a repeat of 2000, when the truth is that the similarity simply lies in the fact that our system is either unable or unwilling to count every vote. Instead, the populace demands immediate victory the night of the election, a condition that never existed before the advent of mass media.

I think it's ridiculous to call this a democracy when we're not willing to count every vote. If you count all the votes and Bush is still on top in Ohio, fine. But a margin of less than 150,000 votes in a large state like Ohio is reason enough to be careful before declaring a victor.

At least I know that in Pennsylvania, Kerry won, probably boosted by a heavy margin in the Philadelphia area. What happened to the rest of the country, I ask myself? President Bush to date has apparently won the popular vote, with something like 3.5 million votes more than Kerry.

A friend of mine already has a theory about that. He says that the American elections are no longer really about democracy or about issues but about money. Whoever can raise the most money and smear the other candidate the most ends up winning. The accusations don't even have to be true, just persistent.

Just think about the pernicious lengths the Bush campaign went to in order to make a Vietnam War hero with three Purple Hearts, a Bronze Star and a Silver Star look like a prancing showoff next to their candidate, who may or may not have completed all of his National Guard duty in the safe zone of the continental U.S.

Key members of the Bush administration have been coming out of the woodwork for at least a year, many of them writing books and talking openly about the mistakes he's made in key areas of national security and foreign relations.

So how does Bush counter this? He doesn't use any facts, just this general sense of fear that he awakens in the American people, making them believe that if you elect Kerry, there's going to be a terrorist attack. Ridiculous.

I mean, if you believe Osama bin Laden's own videotaped statement just four days before the election, America is more likely to be attacked if Bush is reelected.

How can a man who's been shown to be incompetent again and again, who gets before the American people for a debate and can't even finish a sentence properly, how can he get reelected unless people aren't basing their vote on something they don't actually see in his performance?

They are basing their vote, it would appear, on a nebulous thing called "moral values." They've had preachers shouting at them in the pulpit that they need to reelect Bush. Exit polls are showing that there were more people concerned about "moral values" showing up than were concerned about foreign relations, national security, the economy.

What twisted form of Christianity believes that it's morally superior to make like a cowboy and run rampant all over the world, leading to thousands of American and allied deaths, than it is to protect American jobs, than it is to make us stronger in our own backyards?

This must be what Hunter S. Thompson felt like when Nixon was reelected.

I haven't felt like this since George Sr. was elected. That was the first presidential election where I could cast my vote. I remember walking across the Penn State campus in a fury of tears, listening to They Might Be Giants, the song "Everything Right is Wrong Again," wondering what the future held.

I was up late watching the results, and when NBC declared Ohio for President Bush and started breaking down the numbers, showing that according to their figures, it was impossible for Kerry to win, I did break out in tears. I had to call The Gryphon and ask him to come over. I needed a hug.

It helped, but the sour feeling in my stomach remains. And now it's worsened by the news coming over CNN.com that Kerry called Bush to concede.

All I can say is that if someone who wins by dredging up hate against gays, who wins based on a policy of fear and a brutal political machine of misinformation, thinks that he's God's candidate, I have a very appropriate Bible verse for him to read in his inauguration speech.

"Jesus wept."

Copyright 2004 by Alyce Wilson

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