November 3, 2004

It appears the Baby Bush has squeaked through the election and will continue his reign of terror as president. I am very disappointed, to say the least. But on the bright side, at least we’re now half way through this nightmare. And after all, it’s all downhill from here.

Earl and I continue to watch the CNN coverage of the election. Prior to the top of each hour, they cut to the “Crossfire” crew to amuse us with their babble. It’s mildly amusing and I don’t mind watching it. But what’s driving me crazy are these camera whores standing behind the panelists with Bush-Cheney signs. I would still call them camera whores if they were holding Kerry-Edwards signs. They’re damn annoying and should find something more constructive to do.

I think I’m getting a little cranky.

As Earl and I watch the election results chug along on CNN, I can not help but feel anger towards Florida, just like I did during the 2000 election.

This bunch of bumbling, inept and idiotic fools in charge of voting in Florida should be ashamed of themselves. They knew the spotlight would be on them again. They knew that they would have a large number of absentee ballots. And once again, they’re running around with absolutely no clue as to how to accomplish anything. CNN just showed a shot of the absentee voting center in Miami-Dade County and everyone was sitting around with their thumbs up their butt. They’ve given themselves until 12:00 p.m. on Thursday. Well bravo for you, you bunch of hicks.

Florida is screwing up the election once again. Sadly, with governor Jeb Bush and his harem of ugly women, I’m not surprised.

After all the discussion and debate, Earl and I naturally exercised our right to vote this evening. It was a heartwarming experience on many counts.

First of all, it is refreshing to use the tried and true mechanical voting machines that are so common here in New York State. You simply flip the lever over the candidates name and then you move the handle to let yourself out of the booth. No hanging chads. No computers with questionable and secret programming. No rebooting. It’s refreshingly simple and accurate. Other states should follow suit and dump these ridiculous touchscreen voting machines and go for the mechanical systems. In this case, screw technology.

Secondly, Earl’s change of address was not registered properly (apparently anyone that sent their change of address to Albany didn’t get registered properly, at least in this area), and the election officials in the Town of Marcy went out of their way to make sure that he was able to vote. They followed the rules to the letter, without question and without complaint.

And lastly, I was astounded at the number of new voters, young and old, that I observed in the fifteen minutes we were at the polling place. It was nice to see so many citizens caring about government for a change.

While Earl and I are really hoping for a Kerry win, we’re proud that we had the right to vote, regardless of the outcome.