What kind of day has it been?
Have some reading.
The heavy stuff:
- Just the facts, ma'am. Or just the spin, rather, but on your way.
- So Zogby says this. But the Tennessean says this.
- Slight comfort, however momentary.
- Okay, where did this story go?
- Operation Truth
- Hear that, JV? Put on a helmet and pads and get in there.
- No casualties?
- ARGH.
- Read this and get good and irritated just from the timeline.
- Is it too late for this? Maybe. It's worth a look, though. Also, here are the closest Sinclair stations.
- *witty tagline*
- Eisenhower endorsement
- NYT endorsement
- Washington Post endorsement
- The Memphis Commercial Appeal and the Nashville Tennessean have endorsed Kerry. But it's the News-Sentinel endorsement that has me worried, and not just because (wonders never cease) they've come down on the side of Das President. What SK Bubba said.
- The one where Ebert mentions Bush and Hitler in the same breath (pixellated breath, to be sure, but as you like it).
- This'll keep you on your toes for the next week or so.
Miscellaneous "What They Said"s, all more than worthy of your time. If you read nothing else from this post, check these out:
Funny:
- Side-by-side CNN headlines: "Bush: Kerry to outsource security | Kerry: Bush is lying"
- From a Jon Stewart interview:
Q: From a purely comic perspective, do you want four more years of Bush?
A: Well, from a purely comic perspective, you'd want Mr. T to be president. That would be truly fun. But no, I don't cheer for the demise and erosion of the world purely for my own professional standing. I can write jokes about anything. - More wizard duelling: If only.
- Allison, I'm not sure I actually went so far as to call him a debutante. I do remember saying "I'm Jim Lehrer. I'm the belle of the ball." (Wait, that's the same thing, isn't it?)
- What will the Billionaires do after the election?
- Want.
- I wanna be in Baltimore.
- "Mister President, spell Chechnya."
"You forgot Poland!!" - Every time I imitate the president or Cheney lately, it comes out sounding like a cross between Harvey Fierstein and Serpico.
- Fluff.
- So this was good times, but then O'Reilly went on the Daily Show and bashed the President. No, really. You can download it here.
- So Adam and I saw Outfoxed at the Pilot Light. At one point, a Fox analyst actually makes the claim that "the market doesn't like John Kerry". Quiet hilarity ensued:
Holly: "The market would like an ice cream cone."
Adam: "The market will get the next round."
Holly: "The market would like that margarita with twice the tequila and half the attitude." - This almost killed us all.
- So Lauren and I had a brilliant plan to rid ourselves of Nader....
- Watch this.
- It has been brought to my attention that I would have to know something about politics to know who Tucker Carlson is. Can't a girl trash a bow-tie-rocking flunkie in peace? I'm crippled, for fuck's sake.
- Just in time.....the return of the Sloganator.
- And this is a no-brainer, but watch the Daily Show. The "2004 Election Fiasco Preview" is not to be missed. Fareed Zakaria was on the other night and brought the Crossfire jokes. Jesse Jackson's proud of us, y'all! Go listen to him say so.
Onward:
- I got really mad at a lot of people today. I don't know how to relate to people who don't vote and don't care to. I can't fathom it. WILL YOU PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF EVERYTHING HOLY (AND MORE THAN A FEW THINGS THAT AREN'T) VOTE?!?!? STAND UP OR SHUT UP. GOD. I WANT SO MUCH TO LIKE YOU PEOPLE AND YOU'RE MAKING IT REALLY HARD. NO, IN A BAD WAY.
Okay, that's out of my system. For today. - Is there something to be said about Jed Bartlet and George Bush falling off their bikes? Me, I was right saddened by the dichotomy.
- The Onion STATshots have been growing progressively more pointed. Last week's was "Why haven't we voted yet?", and one of the answers was "Have been beheaded on video in Iraq". No, seriously.
- A day after Jon Stewart was on Crossfire there were 3001 seeds on Suprnova, and 2111 downloads. Can we round up all these people and rocket to Mars? No?
- Did I ever write about the footage in Fahrenheit 9/11 that was shot at a rally I was working in NH? Seriously, it was the one at Pembrook. I've got pictures. It was such a cold-water shock to see it on the screen.
- I'm still debating whether or not to vote early. I like the symbolism of hitting the booth on Election Day, but the way things are going around here something drastic might get in the way.
- This "flip-flopping" label is getting on my Last. Nerve. Real, thinking people process information, new information, and adjust their convictions or at least their actions accordingly.
I asked someone today if I would ever stop feeling like I haven't done enough. He didn't think so. That said, here's what I've been up to this week to try and convince myself otherwise:
- Debating stem-cell research with a right-wing Catholic life-is-unimpeachable-unless-you're-a-black-man-in-Texas demoniac in front of a bunch of freshmen about to vote in their first election.
- Railing against these pro-life-at-any-cost bitches that descended on our campus like a plague of self-righteous, appallingly misguided locusts, on the afternoon of Take Back The Night, no less. Seriously, these assholes had larger-than-life shots of genocidal aftermath, breast cancer operations, and botched abortions on display boards all over the plaza, and the simplest arguments such as "Abortion laws are designed to prevent the kind of back-alley butchery you're pushing on your placard there" had no effect.
- More interestingly, wrapping up a project for one of my PoliSci classes wherein I had to work with four hardcore College Republicans to devise a campaign strategy for Bush in Tennessee. It's not that the work was hard (our thesis, which was well received, was that as long as he doesn't set himself on fire between now and Tuesday he's golden, and even then he might scrape by all right, particularly if such a stunt were prefaced with "Hey y'all, watch this!"), it's that I feared the whole ordeal would be good for nothing more than extended exercise in not being sarcastic. Then I got to know my teammates (one of whom interned for Frist, for fuck's sake), and found four of the most dedicated, level-headed, principled individuals I have ever encountered. They were, of course, leery of me as well, but the respect they displayed for my positions and beliefs never faltered for a moment. Here, then, is to Rebecca, Heather, Ryan, and Jennifer, who for a few short weeks made me a believer in bipartisanship, on however microcosmic a scale.
- Talking to undecided voters, and encountering apathy in quantities staggering enough to move me to depair, but for thought of this: It could get so much worse.
Forecast for the weekend being what it is, and barring an Electoral College meltdown (the odds of which, by the way, are something like 1.34%, which is comforting until you realize those were the odds in 2000 as well), this is in all likelihood the last chance I'll get to do this for some time. So. The final argument. Why John Kerry May Not Be As Much Of A
Douchebag After All:
Look. The triggers are different for everyone. For me, it was the debates that did the trick. I'm a gravitas junkie, and he had it. This is just one slice of an argument I've been making for three weeks, but it's About God Damned Time someone in this race stepped up and displayed a little statesmanship, and I'm grateful it was the guy on our side. I didn't want to smile, but I couldn't help it. There's something there. There's Anything At All.
How much longer can you sleep at night knowing this guy has his finger on the Big Red Button? It's not an average job these two are interviewing for, and we shouldn't settle for such. Are our egos so fatally bloated that we can't stand the idea that the President needs to be someone we aspire to emulate, a cut above the status quo? And no, right now we don't have a hero, but for my part I did everything I could to keep the American people from making this guy our only hope, and sometimes that works out and sometimes I don't live in Sorkintopia, and John Kerry's all we've got. Whether you are moved by that sentiment, or fear of the alternative, be moved. For the sake of everything - be moved.
If they should argue, let us beg to differ
Posted by Nastinchka at October 28, 2004 11:59 PM