Yeah, I voted for Nader. I voted for him in Tennessee a state that Gore ended up losing. Want to blame me for Bush winning? Whatever.
1) The two party system sucks. The lesser of two evils is still evil. (ripping that quote from someone)
2) If Gore had not done so crappy and run such a mediocre campaign then he would never have been in the situation where 1% or 2% made the difference in the election. Saying Nader lost him the campaign is a load of crap, he lost his own campaign. That’s like blaming the cop who pulled you over when you should not have been drinking and driving in the first place.
I am more proud of that vote then I will be of this year’s vote. I plan on voting for whoever is running against Bush, but only because I don’t think this nation can take another 4 years of Bush. I have been suckered into the two party system.
Politics depress me.
-James
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I find it quite strange that people can say that this nation cannot take another 4 years of Bush without giving a decent reason why. Before he entered his presidency, the country had already started a recession. Within a year, we were attacked in the most devastating of ways. Since that time, our economy has improved. The economy has ups and downs regardless of who is in the oval office. However, the most important factor to me is national security. I find it dificult to believe that Gore, Kerry or Nader could have done a better job than Bush has done in the aftermath of September 11. There is still much work to be done in that area. The country (including Democrats and Independents)stood behind the president when he started this quest to defeat terrorism. Voting him out in the middle of the quest does not seem logical.
I did forget to mention something. I agree with you about the two party system. There are times when the two candidates running are not worth putting in office. And you are very accurate in your statement that Gore lost his own election. People tried to use the same argument about Perot in 1992, when it was Bush who in fact lost his own campaign.
It is tough to vote for a candidate that you know is going to lose. However, it is still important to do so in order for the two parties to re-evaluate their message and their candidates for future elections. If we continue to vote for people who we do not think should win, the parties will never see a need to change and they will only get stronger.
What has the ‘war’ in Iraq got to do with terrorism? I thought we were there for the WMDs?
Glad to hear the economy’s improving. I’ll tell that to everyone down at the Unemployment office picking up their last checks. On the way home, I’ve got to stop at the library to pick up the books that the FBI is monitoring, and don’t get me started about what I’ll be listening to on the radio – 100 string orchestra playing the Best of Lawrence Welk.
I’m with James: anybody that votes for Bush is blind/deaf, or very ignorant of the world around them.
"Anybody but Bush – 2004"
"anybody that votes for Bush is blind/deaf, or very ignorant of the world around them" – way to win an argument with reason! Let’s not attack people personally for their political beliefs or anything. That’s not why this country was founded or anything.
"Glad to hear the economy’s improving. I’ll tell that to everyone down at the Unemployment office picking up their last checks." – overall indicators show that the economy is improving. Just because some people are at the unemployment line does not refute that fact. There is always some unemployment regardless of how well the economy is doing.
"What has the ‘war’ in Iraq got to do with terrorism? I thought we were there for the WMDs?" – I hate to see any of our troops anywhere dying, that’s the worst thing in the world. But realistically, is the world a better place without Saddam? I believe so. And what’s done is done. So let’s put the whole damn war thing to rest, get our troops out of harm’s way, and be done with it. I’ll support that any day.
I seem to recall reading several stories in the major media about Iraq harboring terrorists, Al Quaeda fighting against us in Iraq, Saddam paying people to blow themselves up in Israel, etc. On top of that, the war was never all about WMD’s (even though we know he had some in the 90s and I find it hard to believe that he destroyed them – talk about a terrorist threat!). I’ll let you tell the liberated people in Iraq that they were better off with Saddam in office and that waiting another 14 years for the UN to do something (or even to enforce existing resolutions) is a viable option.
I’ll restate – unemployment and the economy have little to do with the who is in the oval office.
Sorry, James, but I gotta blame you for Bush. Gore did run a terrible campaign, but you have to realize that there can be more than one factor in an election. Glad to hear you have had enough of Bush, though.
Dan,
Those stories you heard about were about Zarqari, who was located in the Kurdish, (essentially US controlled) region. He is the guy responsible, we think, for the lastest big bombings in Iraq. Bush’s military advisors were vetoed on a plan to get him before the war, because it may <a href="http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/2004_archives/000428.html">remove the rationale for war</a> (the rationale for war that you bought). This fits a pattern as well. Sandy Berger told Condoleeza that Osama would be her number one concern. She ignored him, and they tabled a plan to go after Osama.
The economy is only doing well in one regard – productivity gains which are off the charts. You can thank the hardworking Americans for that. But there is a massive imbalnce in the economy which has so far translated into a lack of jobs, and stagnant wages for most Americans. You can thank Bush for he imbalance.
Coach,
The stories about paying people to blow up Israelies, using WMDs on his own people, and Al Quaeda helping him in the war last year were all related to Zarqari? Well, his name is similar to Saddam, so I guess I do not have much to say there.
And I guess he was responsible for the mass graves and rape rooms also. Saddam was an evil man and he should have been removed from office a long time ago. I would hope no one would disagree with that.
The war on terror is about removing people who coordinate or harbor terrorist activity. The first action has always (even before Bush) been diplomacy. Diplomacy failed over and over again with Saddam.
What I’m reading here is that Clinton and Bush were both wrong in wanting to remove Saddam from power, thus the need for a third party.
I’m also reading here that the US, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Phillipines, and North Korea would be a much safer place today had Gore or Nader been behind the big desk when we were attacked on 9/11.
I’m also reading that people like Stalin and Hitler and Saddam should be left alone as long as they don’t personally come on US soil and pick on us.
I’m also reading that after an attack that almost cripples our entire airline industry, our tourist industry and trounces consumer confidence in general, that it’s a shocking and even bad that we have stagnant wages and some residual imbalance 2.5 years later.
I’m also inferring from the desire to vote for anybody but Bush that raising taxes in an imbalanced economy is a good idea.
That’s just a few things I’m seeing from reading this blog.
Oddly enough, what I’m not reading here is anything about .NET! :c)
"Oddly enough, what I’m not reading here is anything about .NET!" Good point, JT.
Maybe this falls into "everything nice". However, even if the intent was "nice", comments like "anybody that votes for Bush is blind/deaf, or very ignorant of the world around them" sort of ruin that.
As far as no .NET, c’mon, this site is almost entirely apolitical and devoted to .NET.
This is James’ site and if he wants to put in a dash of political commentary, why not?
Dan,
It is a hard thing to comment on in a short post, but you are misreading my post.
My post wsa related to "Al Quaeda helping him in the war last year". This is (intentionally?) confusing. There is no credible evidence that Saddam was supported by Al Quaeda before the build up to the latest Iraqi war (See Tenet’s comments this week). Before that, the Bush administration was talking about a misleading connection between Al Quaeda and Iraq (misleading, because they implied it was Saddam, but the only credible connection was in the Northern Kurdish controlled area. My earlier post pointed to the story saying that Military advisors to the President were vetoed on going after Zarqari because it would hurt the case for war (presumably because it would make it more obvious how tenuous the Saddam-Al Quaeda threat was. It seems from the comments here that the White House strategy to confuse that issue has been effective.
JT,
There is an enormous difference between cyclical fiscal policy and the structural deficits of the Bush administration budget. The Bush taxes are just very poorly designed for steering us out of a recession (they were designed in a boom with surplusses as far as the eye could see[ remember Checey arguing about the problem of paying of debt too fast!]). These tax cuts go to supply, when the current problem is demand, and their effects have not yet been completely phased in. We need stimulus now, not in the future as Bush’s taxes would have it, but we need responsibility in the long term.
Sorry James, I am getting carried away. Great site.
I still think that we should get rid of primaries, and have a general election in November. The person with the most popular votes wins. AND, no press on interim vote counts until all the polls have closed (even in Hawaii).
Coach,
Thanks for the clarification. So if we take that out, then we still have Saddam paying homicide bombers, somehow "losing" his WMDs, and torturing his own people. All valid reasons (in my opinion) to remove him.
As for the comments about this not being a .NET related blog, I’m sure JT was joking as was I. James, I agree. You do have a great site.
yes, the argument that Nader stole votes from Gore lends some truth to it. The same way that Nader stole votes from Bush. I tend to mosly lean towards the republican side of things, but I couldn’t bring myself to vote for Bush. And I won’t this time either. I wish they had a "None of the above" option on the ballot. If for no other reason than to express people’s lack of confidence in the choices that they are presented with.
Doug,
If you look at the way the state layout was in 2000, you will see that a majority of the states voted in Bush’s favor. This is the reason for the electoral college, so that every state will have a say in determining who wins an election.
I whole-heartedly agree with you that the press should not report any counts until polls close. Very good point
We’re a republic and not a democracy. It’s really the same reason why each state has two senators. Popular voting would essentially drown out the representation of states with small populations. It’s a balance of power. It keeps Idaho from being controlled by the wishes of California and New York. Case in point, upstate New York is at the political mercy of New York City.
JT – right on, that is exactly why the electoral college was formed.
TheCoach – "The economy is only doing well in one regard – productivity gains which are off the charts. You can thank the hardworking Americans for that. But there is a massive imbalnce in the economy which has so far translated into a lack of jobs, and stagnant wages for most Americans. You can thank Bush for he imbalance." Productivity gains only? No jobs? Wrong on both counts. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports unemployment is DOWN and has been on a downward trend since June 2003.
I see your point about the electoral college and understand why it was put in place. But, I guess my opinion has changed over the years. I look at the democratic process meaning "majority wins". Well, isn’t the popular vote the real majority?
BUT, I think there’s only been 1 election where there was a difference between what the electoral college and popular vote defined as the "winner".
My biggest problem is the spread of the primary process over a few months. By the time the Texas primary came along, Kerry was already "defined" (because everyone else dropped out) as the winner and therefore votes in Texas really don’t matter. Is that democratic?
Which goes back to the fact that we are a republic, not a democracy. Throughout history there are examples, like Germany last century, where the popular vote was not such a good thing. When it comes down to it I think most people cry for the popular vote when their guy/gal loses. If their guy/gal wins, they don’t see it as an issue. If we ever switched to a democracy, we would have even more people crying foul because their state or area was not represented.
Regarding the primary, a good thing about America is that if Texas feels slighted, Texas can vote to change their primary date to match or beat the others. :c) Why not be first in line? I think an opening primary in Texas would be fun to watch!
To me the easiest thing would be for all states to have their primaries on the same day, much like the presidential\congress elections are on the same day for every state.
Especially in cases like this year, when Howard Dean was the frontrunner for quite. After John Kerry won a couple of states and the national media covered him winning so heavily, many people in other states felt voting for Dean was voting for the eventual loser, so they either changed their vote or did not vote at all.
In my opionion, this is much the same as reporting results in a nationwide election before all polls have closed.
I agree Dan. If we’re going to keep the primary system, why not just have all the primaries on the dame day? Why is it necessary to have a multitude of Super Tuesday’s, and hear an endless string of who’s dropping out of the race each week?
Why not put them all together, let them campaign for a predetermined period of time, and then hold all the state primaries on the same date?
That way each state will never feel slighted (if Texas changes their date to be in front of someone else, then THEY will feel slighted and change it – it’s a never ending cycle).
Darrell,
I did not plan on posting again, but I wanted to correct a common misconception that you have advanced. Productivity gains are increasing faster than GDP. The reason the unemployment rate is going down is not because there are more jobs, it is because the labor force (those who are looking for work) has dropped — normally this occurs when they are discouraged about their ability to find work.
What this means in the short term, is that even if the jobs situation improves before the election, the unemployment number will most likely rise, as the discouraged workers re-enter the work force and start looking for work(this actually happened to GHWB in ‘92).
Now, it is true that we have had some new jobs, I think the estimate is around 360,000 new jobs since the summer, but in order to stay at a constant rate of overall employment we need to keep up with working age population growth (immigration and demographics), and the rule of thumb on that is to keep a constant level we need 250,000 new jobs/month. If you do the division above, you can see we are far short. Far, far short.
If you want to look at the latest projections, and compare the administration’s track record on predictions, I recommend looking at this graph:
http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/2004_archives/000419.html
Does Ralph Nader really want to offer choice to the voters? Maybe. But he definitely doesn’t want to change anything. If he really wanted to change anything he would tell his supporters to vote for Kerry.
People on the ultra left of center(greens) make this argument that gore ran a bad campaign,that the two parties were one in the same,that we should cast a vote of protest to keep the so called "Liberal crusaders" in check.In this election ralph nader only recovered half a million votes. I’m sure that was due largely to the crowd that voted for him earlier but are too afraid to see a world where bush is president for four more years. Well,way back in 2000 we cast our vote for the democrat because we didn’t want EIGHT YEARS of Bush. Because we had someway of knowing before hand that he would be pushing for the christian right.Recruiting hawksuch as Rumsfeld,ashcroft,rice,rove and wolfowitz. we knew they would negelect their duty to terrorism and let something like 9/11 happen. Anyone who says if they had it to do over again they would vote the same or vote the same now is completely nuts and gets off on whining and feeding their inferiority complex.
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