Never Again

Let me walk you through a little bit of my personal history. I've voted in two presidential elections. In 2000 I voted for George Bush because I'd much rather Al Gore point out completely untrue "inconvenient" truths via movies rather than news channels. That, and I thought it would be awesome to have a father and a son Presidential tandem. In 2004 I voted for John Kerry because every time I saw Bush on TV I couldn't help but hear the faint beginnings of John William's 'Imperial March.' In January of this year (2008 for those of you who haven't recovered from Daylight Savings Time), I officially registered Democratic and attended a caucus intending to support John Edwards then voting for Obama out of laziness (I was already in the area) and meatballs (and I'd already had supper!). One month after the caucus, I switched my official party affiliation to "Independent."

My voting record clearly demonstrates I have no loyalty to either party. Do I lean Democratic? Currently, yes. As much fun as it would be to be heteroly-divorced six times while refusing to let our homosexual counterparts marry at all, I think I'll stick with the party that hugs trees and throws paint on mink coats when it comes to the social side of the world thank you very much. I like it when people notice gas prices increasing exponentially prior to hitting $3.68 in the Midwest. I like being told solutions rather than, "Sorry, it's going to probably go over $4.00 this summer." I like Chief Economists who are clean shaven and don't seem to wet their pants every time he's asked his thoughts on chief economic issues. I also like planning, just in general. Hell, even the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants writes strategy before battling the X-Men. Lastly, I don't like it when people throw the dreaded "R" word around justly or not, because they are so disenchanted/frustrated/angry/etc etc.

That said, if a Democrat wins the next election, it won't be because of me. While part of me hates evil, more of me hates stupid, and as Pennsylvania and Hillary Clinton are proving, Democrats are (spell it out now) s t u p i d stupid. Remember the month of January? Sure you do. The holidays had passed and we were in the midst of watching several poorly setup BCS college bowl games. The night Virginia Tech played Kansas, Iowa caucused. What was the consensus coming out of caucus town? Easy: There is no way the Democrats can lose this election. Their turnout rates were much much higher. The Republicans were running a small little dwarf championed by Chuck Norris and a helmet-haired Mormon. The Democrats had a bright-eyed and bushy tailed black man, a woman, and a talented candidate who could have won the election handily. Republicans like lawyers (even trial ones). Republicans don't like black people or women (even voting ones). Hence, if the Democrats would have said, "We back Edwards," boom, election over.

Stupid Decision 1: No one backed Edwards. Curse you meatballs!

Edwards, after the first few rounds of primaries, realized his party had no interest in winning the next election, and dropped out of the race. At the time, he made a statement which I'm too lazy to look up, so I'll paraphrase: "Clinton and Obama need to stop in-fighting or the Republicans will actually have a chance to win an election everyone in December thought they stood zero, ZERO chance to win."

Stupid Decision 2: No one listened to Edwards.

Time moved on and the Republicans, with their fancy college degrees and common sense realized the only chance they had to win is to nominate a Republican who is really a Democrat, only old, senile, and easy to mold to the will of the party. Thus Mit took his wives back to Utah, Huckabee got an agent in an attempt to be a celebrity, Giulianni proved to be half retarded with his "Florida or bust" strategy, and Thompson tried to campaign solely through reruns of Law and Order rather than speeches. The dust settled and McCain was hailed as a glorious phoenix, rising from his own ashes to gain the nomination. It's similar to a below .500 team making the playoffs because they play in a pathetic division.

But as the 2006 St. Louis Cardinals proved, even crappy teams can win the Big One if their opponents completely forget how to play the game.

At the same time McCain became the sole Republican candidate, Obama went on a crazy win streak and distanced himself from Hillary by over 100 delegates. It became clear Hillary was mathematically eliminated from overtaking the delegate lead. What happens? She starts campaigning the superdelegates and asks for Michigan's and Florida's ineligible delegate (ineligible due to a blatant and knowing breaking of the rules) totals to count towards her election.

Stupid Decision -100: Having super delegates because you don't trust your uneducated "voters" to decide elections.

Stupid Decision -5: No one bitch slapping party leaders in Michican and Florida for wanting to seem more important by holding their primaries prior to date they were allowed to.

Stupid Decision -4: Michigan and Florida leaders running the early primaries even after the Party told them their delegates wouldn't be seated.

Stupid Decision 3: Democratic party leaders not coming out and saying, "whoever wins the most "voting delegates" will also win the support of ALL the "super" delegates. (Sidebar: super? really? are they an early 90's Nintendo game?)

Stupid Decision 4: Every Democrat in the entire world not taking math classes.

Stupid Decision 5: Hillary, after agreeing NOT TO CAMPAIGN in MI or FL, says, "it's only fair to the voters in those states to seat the delegates at the convention," and no one shoots her. Nevermind any Democrat with an ounce of sense from those states didn't vote because it was well publicized IT DID NOT MATTER. Idiots. Just wow.

Stupid Decision 5.5: No one flat out said, "Absolutely not," to the idea of seating MI or FL delegates. People actually considered doing another election. Let that be a lesson kids, when you break rules that are pubicly talked about on CNN and in newspapers, all you have to do is whine and your parents will consider giving you your way. At the very least, they'll let you know how sorry THEY are that YOU broke the rules.

Even though Hillary became mathematically inelegible, she and Obama subjected America to six weeks of arguing, bickering, and destroying each other as they campaigned in Pennsylvania. Obama became an "elitist" and strange church allegations arose. Hillary proved to be stubborn and insane, as her friends started to officially back Obama and she and Bill would call their "betrayals" out in public. Six weeks later, when the primary actually happened (this magic primary that would help end the election) Hillary gained a whopping 10 delegates in the race. This puts the "people" delegate count at 1,491 for Obama and 1,333 for Hillary. It's over, and yet...

Stupid Decision 6: Hillary 'winning' Pennsylvania "gives her the momentum" to carry on to NC and IN in 12 days. Great. That's good.

Stupid Decision 7: Top Democratic officials not cutting off funding to Hillary and telling her, "It's over. Deal."

Stupid Decision 8: The two candidates continue to jab and jab at each other, both looking like clowns, while McCain gains momentum and is doing a great job walking the fine line between being loyal to his party but bashing the current Pres' approach to Katrina, Iraq, and humanity in general.

This upcoming election shouldn't have been close, regardless of who the Democrats nominated. The country feels dejected and angry at the current Pres. His approval ratings read like baseball scores. And yet, his party might stand a chance of staying in office in these troubled times all because of math:

Democrats + Greed = Complete Stupidity

The power of mild intelligence > The effect of eight years of super villainy

As I said, if the Democrats win the next election, or any election going forward, it won't be because of my vote. I may not vote Republican, but the Democratic party's sheer amount of incompetence has officially turned me away. Forever. Irreperably.