Good News, Bad News, Good News
The first Presidential election I got to vote in was 1988. Ergo, this November I will vote in my 6th Presidential General election.Good News:
For the first time I was looking at not 1 but 4 possible candidates that I would actually be happy not only to vote for but to work for. In the first 5 elections I was, like many people, voting for the lesser of two bad choices. I won 3 and lost 2 and constantly regretted not being a little bit older so that I could say that I voted for Ronald Reagan.
Bad News:
Two of the four are now out of the race. I really liked the records and platforms of both Duncan Hunter and Fred Thompson. I never really thought that Duncan Hunter would be a viable candidate on the national stage. While I really like the guy he just comes across as a terribly boring bureaucrat. Fred on the other hand is an actor with charisma coming out of his ears. He had the ability to energize the base and independents and maybe (especially given the fact that all of the viable candidates on the Dem side are basically Socialists) center-left Democrats. I was very disappointed that he didn't seem into being President. I can't really blame him. He has a new family and a mother who is apparently in very poor health that he is taking care of. I cannot be upset with him that his heart just wasn't into working his butt off for a job paying less than he was already making that is 25 hours a day in a pressure cooker with where he is in his personal life. Such is life.
Good News:
There are still two excellent candidates left. Both Mitt Romney (my personal favorite for reasons I will get into in another post) and Rudy Giuliani are great candidates who I believe would make a great President. This should have been a Mitt/Rudy race by now. I really think Rudy messed up in being absent for the early primaries and staking all of his hopes on Florida. Only time will tell the answer to that (and if he pulls it off he will go down as a political genius) but either would get my enthusiastic support. Both are natural leaders who are strong on the things I care about for this election.
The other good news is that even the other possible candidates for the Republicans are acceptable (John McCain and Mike Huckabee) and will not make it hard to show up and at least vote for the least poor of the choices in the general election (again, especially since they will be running against a Socialist). Huckabee is weak and would probably get slaughtered by either of the leading Dems while McCain would have a decent shot at the general if he could just stop incessantly poking his finger in the eye of the base. I don't think either would have as much of a chance against either Billary or Obama as Mitt or Rudy but McCain would at least have a shot if he can behave himself.
posted by mailgeek @ 10:54 PM
0 comments
