Elections

It's pretty strange being here in Lima for the election. I voted just
before I left the states on Oct. 7, but I'm used to sitting and watching
the returns with some like-minded individual(s).

In '96 (the first election in which I could vote), I voted by absentee
ballot because I was hiking the Appalachian Trail, but I sat and watched
the returns with some friends of the family in Waynesboro, VA, where I
was hiking at the time. I won't say who I voted for that time, but his
name rhymes with "Bob Dole". I still like Dole. I think the Republican
party would be doing a lot better than they are if there were more
people like him. Less Laffer Curve and more stem cell research.

In '00, I watched election returns with Emily at "The Pub" at the
student union at the University of Alaska. I voted in Alaska in the
student union. Alaska, ironically, has one of the more technologically
advanced voting systems that I've used.

In '04, we were on Vinalhaven Island, Maine, where elections pretty much
run the way they have for 200 years. You go into the basement of the
church (separation of Church and State, anyone?), the poll volunteers
(generally old women and men, like anywhere else) greet you by name and
don't bother to check your ID, because they know all 1400 people who
vote on the island, who they're related to, what house they were born
in, and who they're sleeping with at the moment. Then, they give you
your ballot, you fill it out, then you drop it in this big wooden box
(probably the same ballot box they've been using since 1936.)

Anyways, this year I'm in Lima for the election. I voted for Obama with
a mail-in ballot when I was still in Colorado. I don't buy into the
whole "Mr. Obama Goes to Washington" bit--I think it's naiive to think
he'll change the system around (and frankly, I'd be a little concerned
it he did. Our system works pretty damn well) and I still have worries
about his lack of experience (and his opinions on trade policy).

However, we can't afford a president who can't even keep his campaign
from falling apart every couple of months, and that seems to be pretty
much what's been happening with he (not) original maverick.

It also scares the hell out of me that the VP under McCain would be
someone who knows less about (a) foreign policy, (b) economic policy,
and (c) major newspapers in the United States than Sarah and Elliot
Robles. Personally, I think McCain would have done better to pick Jodie
Rell, current governor of CT. Or, for that matter, anyone else. Or at
least anyone that doesn't remind me of Kristina Kirchner.