October 24, 2004

I suppose I should just come clean with my readers now. This year I simply can not bring myself to vote for George W. Bush. I apologize to those of you whom I might have upset, but I just can't do it, despite my best efforts.

This may seem strange considering the history of my personal political thinking. Ever since I was old enough to comprehend and articulate the nuances on higher-level political discourse as seen on Crossfire , that is, around 3 and a half or so, I've been a Republican, based primarily on the key issue (still divisive in many so-called "battleground states") of whether the donkey or the elephant is the cooler mascot. At a ripe young age I came down hard on the side of the elephant, given that, in a battle to the finish, the elephant could simply step on the donkey, rendering it far more two-dimensional than is beneficial to ongoing life, or, failing that, stab it with its tusks or squirt hydrochloric acid on it with its trunk, given, of course, a reasonable supply of hydrochloric acid. It was also significant that the local university's mascot was an elephant, as should be obvious from Alabama's team name, "The Crimson Tide."

Unfortunately, my level of political understanding has gone downhill from those heady early days when the issues were still fresh and relatively clear. Now, I must base my political decisions on the information presented to me by cable news channels, which consists almost exclusively of updates to the Laci Peterson trial ("Nothing interesting yet, Greta."). As you can see, the issues this year are very subtle and nuanced, and it is high time we voters demand to know whether Kerry and Bush feel that Scott Peterson is a lunatic killer, or simply a malignant jerk. We are also very concerned about whether Martha Stewart's imprisonment should be deemed "amusing" or merely "satisfying." The public demands answers.

I suppose we could always rely on prime time political commercial spots, although after listening to those we would feel forced to choose between Kerry, inviting nucular war, or Bush, inviting economic meltdown. For those of you who ever participated in a little thing called "policy debate" in the high school, you've probably experienced this phenomenon before. The other team would always end their final rebuttal by saying, "Their plan will lead to NUCLEAR WAR!!!!!!! Ours will merely lead to the collapse of currencies worldwide . The choice. (dramatic pause). is clear." We might have been debating whether to raise the minimum wage 15 cents, and it would still come down to nuclear war versus economic meltdown, with the judge thoughtfully grimacing the whole way through, as if any of this made sense. I had no evidence cards to prove it, but the whole thing seemed blatantly silly. It did not help that the teams spoke at approximately 900 majillion words per minute, as if the crap in their case would be seriously aided by the addition of more crap, but only if you couldn't actually hear any of it. Of course, with the presidential arguments, the words are spat far more slowly, thank goodness, but the content is still out the wrong end, so to speak.

I suppose I could have watched the presidential debates, but there was a rerun of The Andy Griffith Show on, so that was of the question. I suppose I could have listened to those scary enthusiastic people telling me to "rock the vote," but really, is there anything more frightening than someone who really cares about politics? Like, not just maintains a passing interest or a hobby, but really foaming-at-the-mouth, freaky-cult-level-worship cares? (Hint: no). Every time I see one of those stupid posters encouraging people to get out and vote, I want to put up a poster of my own that reads something to the effect of "Caring Kills! Stay home on November 2!" Really. What did Hitler, Pol Pot, Chairman Mao, Tammy Faye Baker and other unspeakable autocrats have in common except that they all cared too much? If they had just taken a few quadzillion chill pills, the twentieth century could've been less gory by several hundred million people. But man, people feel this election is so very, all-encompassing, drop-dead, the world-will-not-go-on important, it makes me want to barf in a projectile fashion. It's unhealthy. Calm down!

People take this election so seriously you see news stories all the time with headlines like this: "GEORGIA MAN FOUND BUSING 600 INELIGIBLE VOTERS AROUND FLORIDA. CLAIMS TO NOT KNOW 'HOW THEY GOT IN THERE.'" Or, "DEMOCRATIC VOTING COMMISSIONER CALLS FOR INVESTIGATION INTO VOTER INTIMIDATION AFTER REPUBLICAN OFFICIAL OBSERVED DRIVING PAST POLLING PLACE." And so on.

So caring seems silly, but nonetheless, I was determined to make my voice heard in my first presidential election. Unfortunately, I had not arranged before I left for my Arkansas-located university to pick up an absentee ballot in Alabama . You can not simply mail the application to the circuit clerk in Alabama . You must actually visit him and sign the form in person, showing proper ID, rendering the concept of "absentee ballot" a little stupid. Now, I understand this is all a necessary measure to prevent rampant voter fraud (in 2000, Gore received a little over 2% of the Alabama vote, which seemed suspiciously high). But it's still frustrating, because it means that I have to drive back to Alabama to get my absentee ballot and then drive back to Arkansas so I can actually be an absentee.

So that's what I did this weekend, me and my brother driving back in order to fulfill our civic duty and maybe, along the way, avoid schoolwork. I told him that, considering how very very very busy I was, I won't go home with you unless you make absolutely sure that (1) the deadline to pick up an absentee ballot has not passed and (2) the courthouse will be open on Saturday. I should have added (3) and the website you get the information from has to have been updated sometime in the current millennium, but alas, I did not. So we drive home and arrive at the courthouse on Saturday to discover that it is closed and locked. The voting registration center in the annex was "open" in the sense that we could walk in, but as the happy government employee working there informed us in a friendly voice, they were closed, and no, we could not pick up an absentee ballot there, and yes, we were jerks for asking, thank you. So I was a little upset.

"Never fear!" I thought, because the Republican Party headquarters is always open! So I barged right in and discovered a covey of. let's just say very interesting looking people, who were very eager to make sure I got my absentee ballot (they never asked who I intended to vote for; it could've been Dave Barry for all they knew), so eager, that this one lady kept trying to get me to fill out the form so she could mail it to the circuit clerk herself right then , and this other guy kept yelling at her something about illegal and getting the Republican Party in trouble and she kept saying that she didn't see any problem with doing the mailing if I actually filled out the form, so I quietly excused myself, taking several patriotic pens with me on the way out, because I was scared. Another casualty of caring too much, I decided.

So, as my dad informed me later on, the only way I could possibly get my absentee ballot was to actually show up at the courthouse on Monday, which was unacceptable. So Jonathan and I drove back to Harding, knowing that this year, every vote would not be counted.

And that is why I will not be voting for George W. Bush. If Kerry gets elected and the world plunges into NUCLEAR WAR!!!!!! you will not be able to blame me. But somehow, I just can't bring myself to care.