Some conversation of last weekend reminded me that in the past, in these notes, I may once or twice have been non-critical of GWBush. For the record, I officially regret any such non-critical comments, and I want to say that I think he is a fuck-up (and those who know me may have noticed that I don't say "fuck" very often) and should not be president. It seems to me that he is all "dude, check me out, I'm PRESIDENT! woo!" while all his people run round doing the actual work. In addition to the ridiculous tax cuts, this article that my brother linked to recently gives one scary example of how he does not seem to be one who can think and act quickly and well in a crisis.

I would much rather John McCain be in, for the Republicans; he strikes me as a straight-up honest guy, and he tried his best to get the money out of the system, and he doesn't want drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. His POW ordeal proved that he has the right sort of character; he was given the chance to leave, since he was an admiral's son, and he refused. It might have even been a tough call between him and Gore, if I'd had that choice in 2000 (though almost surely I'd still have gone with Gore, because of all the other non-McCain Republicans).

Politics were not discussed a lot in our family when I was growing up. The story goes that my parents, who married in 1970, went round and round trying to convert each other about the Vietnam war (mom pro, dad anti), until it came to a head with the 1972 election (mom for Nixon, dad for McGovern) and they decided that they'd rather stay married than try to talk politics any more. This lasted, despite the odd random exclamation at the TV here and there, until the Clintons pushed my mother to her breaking point and she couldn't help asking my dad how he could support such a terrible person. There's been a little more talk since then (Dad has echoed those comments in the other direction, about Bush II), but at this point each knows pretty well where the other stands and they don't bother to wrangle too much.

Howard Dean was recommended to me, last weekend. I haven't done my research yet; I don't know much about him. But then last night I read an article in The New Republic about how his campaign is making use of the Internet to gather grassroots support. In fact, the supporters started up before the campaign even got involved; the campaign discovered some of them and thought, "wow, this could be a really good idea." And the article compared Dean to McCain in the appeal of his personality, which also piques my interest. So now I need to go research his positions and goals. It would be nice to have a politician I could get excited about, especially on the Democratic side. The article said that Dean was expected (by whoever makes those sorts of pronouncements) to fade away after his antiwar stance became moot, but because of this spreading Internet-borne interest, he hasn't. Cool.

I don't need someone who agrees with every single position that I have. That's not a realistic expectation. All I want is someone who believes a good many of the same things (and certain of my most important ones, such as abortion rights and wilderness preservation), and is honestly willing to put the good of humanity, as s/he sees it (and within shouting distance of how I'd see it), above all else. That is someone I can vote for. Wouldn't it be nice if there were multiple such to choose from.

copyright 2003 carrie lynn king.