Is it really over?
It has been an anticlimactic couple of weeks. After the ALCS, the Series went off with a whimper. After the sturm und drang of Campaign 2004, the election went off with its own whimper – mostly from Democrats.
Some thoughts:
- As hard as it is for me to admit it, John Kerry may have proven his fitness for office in defeat. His remarks yesterday were noble and dignified, worthy of a good man and a true American. I am sure I will have infinite opportunity to disagree with him in the future but right now I owe him thanks for his graciousness.
- Nobody noticed, but another President was elected Tuesday: Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan. His challengers conceded today with some of the same nobility offered by the Senator. Anyone who thinks the Iraqi people are not watching and listening and praying for the future is insane.
- Congratulations to the American people! I still believe strongly that the franchise should be limited but at least the people made a strong decision one way or the other. 51% is nothing to sneeze at, it’s a bigger mandate than President Clinton had in either of his two terms. Great things are afoot.
- And while on the subject of great things, the most radical year in my memory dashes forward. Arafat is in a coma and, we hope, on his death bed. May he enjoy a glimpse of his 72 raisins as he’s whisked off to his eternal torment. There is great potential here. I leave it to American diplomacy to screw it up.
- Will this election finally be the death knell for 1960s hippie liberalism? I am desperate to have a loyal opposition party again in this country. I know no one will believe it but it is deeply unsettling to me to contemplate voting a straight party ticket in every election. I haven’t yet, but I’ve come close. Where are the Bob Caseys? The Harry Trumans? The John Kennedys? Where are the decent Democrats who care more about the nation than their constituencies? Where are the guys who will vote for tort reform, for tax cuts, against compulsory unionism? We need those people back, badly.
Victory is sweet. We will all be the better for it. Wait and see.
November 4th, 2004 at 2:39 PM
To follow up on your last point, I don’t quite agree that we just need 1 party to change. Being an Independent, I agree with some of the Republican beliefs, some of the Democrat beliefs. And, I agree that the Democratic party needs to move a little more right for me to feel more comfortable with them. Having said that, I also think that the Republican party needs to move more left, as I think they’ve over-compensated for the Democrating stretch to the left. I think, magic-bullet craziness aside, that Arlen Spector is the kind of Republican that I think the party needs more of. On the Democratic side, stop rolling out the John Edwards’ of the world, and focus more on the middle class’ values. We’ve become a nation very divided politically, with not many in the middle. As a nation, I think we need to be more centrist.
November 4th, 2004 at 3:35 PM
My God man! Arlen Specter is currently in the running for the most worthless man in the universe.
There is a middle but Americans have never been and will never be good at staying in the middle. We’re a people of extremes: wildly optimistic, then wildly despairing, making money hand over fist or suffering through a terrible depression. We don’t do things by half measures.
That being said, things may find a center point but just now there are seventy plus years of bad ideas and bad policies to be repaired and/or undone. All the New Deal/Great Society problems have to be reviewed and then repaired or scrapped. And that’s just policy-wise. The deterioration of American culture since the 1960s has to be arrested and then sent back slightly the other way.
You know perfectly well that to get arrest momentum you first have to apply force in the other direction. Things will settle, they always do.
-bp