President Barack Obama won re-election Tuesday night and whether or not that makes you happy, we can probably still agree we’re glad the campaign is finally over.
I was stunned when I heard the news. Actually missed it at first. Still had the Comedy Network on. When I flipped back to CNN, the projection had been posted. Obama had won. Still hard to believe. I was prepared for days of counting and wrangling over ballots. But now, several hours later, there seems to be no doubt. Even the popular vote is coming around to an Obama victory.
What a relief. It’s all over, and over in a single evening. The people have spoken. Obama will lead us for four more years. Tomorrow we can finally put this horrid campaign behind us and get back to work.
6 billion dollars in campaign spending and… nothing’s changed!
Did this country really just waste 6 billion dollars?
Well, at least I can answer the phone again.
In retrospect:
I hope all of the people who were forced to stand in long lines at the polls know why they had to stand at long lines, and who made that possible for them.
I hope all of the red matter in this country doesn’t implode, because there appears to be significant mass.
I hope Congress doesn’t declare that their primary goal is to ensure a Republican is elected president in the next election, and that they’ll oppose the current administration at every possible chance.
I hope tax reform is taken seriously and not given up on again.
I hope we can do something about the fiscal cliff besides postponing it.
The amount spent on this election, given the very real problems we have nationwide, was criminal — or at least morally and ethically questionable. (Thanks for nothing, Supreme Court.) How many jobs could that money have created? How many roads and bridges could it have repaired? Would those donors consider giving that much to the Hurricane Sandy relief effort? Our priorities in this country are so screwed up. Yes, it’s a free country and people have the right to spend their money any way they want, but still …
Going forward, how ’bout spending that much money to bring our voting process up to 21st Century standards. Voting should be a computerized process, fraud-proof, and instantaneously recorded and counted. Standing in line for hours at the polls in order to mark a paper ballot is ridiculous. My daughter-in-law was an official poll judge yesterday, as she was four years ago, and you wouldn’t believe her stories about what goes on behind the scenes. Or maybe you would.
As for the fiscal cliff … you know Congress will just kick that into next year. Even at our offices and everyday jobs, we all know nothing meaningful gets done between now and New Year’s. Too many holidays, too many vacations, too much going on. There’s no continuity. No one gets anything done, even if they go to work, because half their co-workers are gone.
At least, as you said, I can answer the phone again.
Applause
It does seem to have been an arduous business, PT. All the best for the next four years.
Thanks, Kate. It has been arduous. Ridiculously so. We really need to reform our system.
I was surprised they called it, too even thought some are still being counted – but relieved we weren’t forced to hear days of complaints and anger.
I’m about ready to go back to signed paper ballots with photo ID and thumb prints – too many glitches with the machines this year
I’m all in favor of photo IDs. Ought to be mandatory. Never had to provide a thumb print, though. My son’s idea is photo IDs with implanted computer chips to ensure they can’t be duplicated and that they can be counted like ballots just by popping them into a slot. I dunno what the answer is, but in this day and age, there has got to be a better way.
the chips sound like a good idea –
the finger print is used in other countries – mainly to show that person with painted finger already voted.
Having had 3 years of someone trying to vote in my name has made me wish there was some sort of plan
Wow, someone trying to take my vote would turn me into a crusader of some kind really fast. And they say the notion of voter fraud is … a fraud. Hah!
Yeah, I get REALLY cranky when people say voter fraud doesn’t exist
I really don’t mind all the money involved in politics these days. As far as I’m concerned, anyone who can convince people to give them free money must be a pretty damn good politician. But joking aside, the money has nothing to do with the perception of this campaign as nasty. It certainly facilitated the promulgation of nastiness, but that nastiness has been there ever since a black Democrat was elected to the White House.
First of all, though, campaigns have always been nasty. It was once commonplace for simple political discourse to end with a freakin’ gunfight, or as they so elegantly referred to it back then: dueling. And remember that whole civil war thing?
[With all due respect], I can tell you’re certainly at least a good little bit more conservative than you like to admit (on this blog anyway) by the fact that you were surprised that Obama won, or even just that he won by so much. To me, the prospect that Americans would elect another Republican a mere 4 years after Bush is the most laughable of any conceivable political prospect. Republicans don’t understand something. Whether they want to acknowledge it or not, they not only elected W. as a popular minority, exposing the extreme level of absurdity and corruption that permeates every level of our electoral process, upon becoming president in literally the least democratic way any president has ever come to power, he goes and destroys our economy by using our soldiers as play-toys. Only a true conservative doesn’t understand the political dynamics of that. Democrats have picked up a whole demographic of voters: non-Republicans. They used to only have Democrats, now they have Democrats and every [true] independent as well.
Oh gosh this tends to happen when discussing political topics. I don’t stop. But I’ll force myself to so you don’t have to go through pages of a single comment to respond. I will add that I hope I didn’t come across as disrespectful in any of that, and apologize sincerely if I did.
Well, I’m an independent who wanders indiscriminately across party lines, depending on the issue. I was surprised Obama won only because I’m a natural pessimist and figured Romney’s winning would be bad enough without my having been sky high on Obama. I didn’t want to have to fall any farther than necessary. I wasn’t that enthusiastic about Obama, but he was not-Romney and the thought of a Romney presidency was terrifying.
I mind the money a great deal. You see, Colorado is a swing state, and the out-of-state money that flowed into Colorado in an effort to sway our voting, our elections, was infuriating!! This is precisely how all that corporate money influences and corrupts our election system. In Washington, our lawmakers march to the tune of the heavily funded (and funding) corporate lobbyists. We little guys no longer have any say there because we can’t afford to buy the votes.