Election results

I... am... very disappointed! It's not that I had any illusions that Kerry was going to be a great President, but Bush? I mean, c'mon. He's such a... such a... smeg-head! Grrr.

Election results aside, this was an interesting one for me because, for the first time in my voting career, I relied solely on the internet for watching the returns. Matter of necessity, really, 'cause we're totally without any form of television service. I looked at the web sites for the three big "all news" stations: CNN, FoxNews, and MSNBC. Surprisingly, MSNBC's was the worst by far -- practically unusable. Ironic given that one of its major backers is a software company. FoxNews's was the most usable, while, although more awkward than Fox's, CNN's site had the most useful information.

As a final little election tidbit, I was listening to Maine Public Radio on the way home from work this evening and caught an interesting quote from George Smith of the Sportsmen's Alliance of Maine. Of the opposition's recent TV ad campaign he said (at 13:15), "...if you put on, night after night, cattle being slaughtered, bacon would be banned. " Bacon? From a cow? This genius also wants a constitutional amendment preventing wildlife management issues from being allowed on the ballot. Awfully sporting of him, wouldn't you say?

Odd decision by the Bush camp

Access to Bush website blocked from outside the US

Political Signs

Driving home from dropping off my son this morning, I noticed a zillion political signs dotting the landscape and had to wonder "what's the point?". I mean, it's not like a sign is big enough to provide any real useful information. In fact, I can only see a few possible scenarios where they'd affect voting outcome:

Sparking interest: This is the optimist's scenario -- that upon seeing a sign, the viewer will be inspired to hop on the internet and learn more about the issue or candidate. Political signs have been around for far longer than the internet, however, and it's still difficult to find anything of substance on local candidates.

Recommendations: I suppose if you saw a political sign in front of the house of someone you knew and respected, you might take that into account when making your decision. It seems equally likely, however, that the person putting up the sign might be widely viewed to be a bumbling idiot, so from a political standpoint it's likely to be a wash.

Lowest common denominator: This seems to be the likely reason that folks put up political signs -- that a significant number of voters go to the polls without any real knowledge of what they're voting on and will therefore pick a name that they recognize or a position that they think is "popular". What a way to pick a candidate.

RSS Feed of the RTP (Random Time Period)

As we close in on election day, many folks will be watching with bated breath to see whether less-than-inspiring aristocrat John Kerry can overthrow the truly moronic fascist George Bush (no bias here!). The electoral-vote site has an RSS feed which lets you quickly view how their predictions steadily decline towards W. Unfortunately, no one seems to have an answer for why we haven't had a good option for president in years. Maybe, instead of an election, we should institute a Presidential draft since, as Douglas Adams posits,

those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it... anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.

Oh, wait a minute. Is that what we already have? Is W just a right-wing nutjob version of Zaphod Beeblebrox? Was the war in Iraq his Heart of Gold? If so, someone certainly screwed up when they picked the real power -- more of an Emperor Palpatine than the wise man of Adam's Galaxy. Oh well. Where's Han Solo when you need him?