JUST GIVE UP ALREADY

I know this space is normally occupied by a little bean, but don't fear -- it's only moved down so I can say something more important. This election nightmare has to end, but old Al refuses to give up. Yet again, he went on TV and repeated the same, tired old line -- Every vote must be counted. Please, every vote has been counted -- sometimes 4 times already. Just because there's no vote on the ballot doesn't mean it was supposed to have a vote. Most people realize that there will be a certain amount of irregularity in the voting process, but that those irregularities will be statistically balanced out for either side. But with Al picking where the recounts are going, he's throwing the fairness of the election process into the toilet. According to Florida Law (and the judicially rewritten law) Al Gore lost Florida. Period. We want an end to the election, not more rhetoric and excuses. And what's worse than the banal repetition, is the raw hypocrisy of his statements. He want's all the votes counted, even though he has lawyers in one county fighting to have one counties votes thrown out because of 'voter fraud' -- Sorry Al, just because they didn't vote for you doesn't indicate voter fraud. And where's all that concern for the absentee military ballots that were thrown out? They weren't postmarked before the required date -- truth is, they weren't postmarked at all, because they didn't require stamps. So they don't follow the rule of law -- well, votes that didn't have a punched out chad don't follow the rule of law either, but you want to count them. Then there's the democratic commentators that try to excuse Al's behavior by saying George W. would do the same thing if the situation was reversed -- even though there's no proof of that. In fact, one of the media's complaints about Bush was that he didn't have an original thought of his own, he was always consulting daddy's advisors. These advisors are all men who came up admiring Richard Nixon -- who had the good grace to accept defeat back in the early '60's even when he had a perfect right to protest election fraud (Bill Daley's hometown no less). So I truly think Bush would just go back to work running Texas, and start thinking about next time. So please find some other excuse for your candidates childish behavior and stop assuming it's universal. You know, up until a week before the election I was all prepared to vote for Al Gore. Bush struck me as a man who was born with a silver foot in his mouth -- a rich little boy who had everything he ever needed provided by his daddy. But then I started thinking about other stuff and decided to switch over -- and I'm glad I did. Not because my vote would have counted -- Bill Daley made sure Illinois was firmly in the Gore camp (although actually, only Chicago was -- the rest of the state voted for Bush) -- but because Al's true colors are showing quite brilliantly now. I can't even stand the sound of his voice anymore. And as far as winning the popular vote -- I think Al can safely assume that he's trashed that advantage as well. Last polls I heard were 60% fed up with him and climbing. It does give us a good excuse to finally trash the electoral college system. I've heard it said that it won't happen, because the small states would lose thier voice in the presidential selection process. Think about it though, this election was decided by the big states anyway. If you saw the big county by county winner map, you would have seen that Bush won almost everywhere except lower Florida, California, the areas around the Great Lakes, and a few scattered large cities. Heck, Gore didn't even win his own state!! I have an interesting proposal for a modified Electoral College. Instead of all the state electors going to the winner, they should be divided up by congressional district (which is how the number of electors is determined anyway). If a candidate wins a district, he wins the elector for that district -- whoever wins the state gets the 2 electors for the senators. Of course that won't happen because it makes sense. But don't tell me the current system gives smaller states a bigger voice. Both candidates spent more time schmoozing Floridians living in Isreal than Montanans living in Montana.

But whatever happens, let's hope it's soon. I'm getting tired of this.

Now back to the regularly scheduled page, already in progress.