You fucking idiots.

So a bunch of completely deluded Democrats, upset that their favorite Democratic nominee — Capitol Hill herself — didn't get the ticket, decided that...as some form of protest, or vengeance, or punishment, or "nyahh nyahh," or whatever...they are voting Republican.

Yeah, that's right. The "Democrats for McCain" are voting for the fucking Republican because their choice of candidate isn't on the Democratic ticket. Are you fucking kidding? Allow us to address these fucks directly...

Listen up, fucks. Setting aside the fact that eight years of a virtual unquestioned Republican monarchy has left us utterly screwed, and the most vital decision now involves simply getting power out of their hands, what the fuck are you smoking? Clinton and Obama are virtually identical candidates, for fuck's sake! Please don't point out your handful of issues that you believe denote vastly different policies between one and the other, issues which we can pretty much guarantee you will go completely unaddressed for the next four years, no matter who is in the Haig-seat (that is, "in charge here"). The bottom line here is that if you supported Hillary, and now you find only two candidates left in the race, neither of which is Hillary, logic, basic intelligence, and common sense all clearly dictate that Obama is far, far closer to representing your Hillary-smitten values than McCain could ever be. It's really that simple. Any other choice would seem to be a clear-cut case of cutting off your nose to spite your face.

"Oh, you didn't put my candidate in the finals?" you say. "Well fuck you, then. I'm voting for the person who stands for the opposite of everything my candidate stood for, instead of for the guy who beat out my candidate, and who shares about 99.9% of her views. That'll show everyone. We'll see who's sorry if McCain wins!" Yeah, fuckheads, we'll see who's sorry. Everyone. Including you.

It doesn't matter whether it's Hillary or Barack, you stupid shits. What matters is that the Republican party has been enjoying a fine time thanks to idiots like you who don't question anything going on.

Modern American politics is a fucking show. Ignore the speeches, ignore the spectacle, and focus on the fact that the ramifications of continued Republican control are a fucking nightmare. This isn't the goddamn NBA — it doesn't matter who makes that spectacular, sportsreel-worthy slam dunk. This is college basketball — and we simply want the right team to win.

Keep in mind: we, at the Two Percent Company, are not Democrats. They've got way too many problems, too. So it isn't "our team" in the sense that we attend that particular NCAA school; it's "our team" in the sense that we're backing the school that graduates 94% of their athletes as opposed to the one that graduates 20%; the school that adheres to the rules, as opposed to the one under investigation for numerous violations; and the school that might actually give us a few points in our March Madness brackets instead of sucking us fucking dry. We don't care who's playing center, we don't care if they take a shot from half-court — just play some fucking D, use some good teamwork, and sink the fucking ball into the hoop more often than the other teams.

Look, there's simply no way that an independent is going to get elected to the highest office in the land with the current political scene, which promises to perpetuate itself for at least several more generations. We hold out very little hope of seeing even a "Three-Party System" within this century, and we're pretty optimistic motherfuckers. So we're stuck with Democrats and Republicans. And the only way to keep these fucks from bullying us is to keep them busy bullying each other, which means we change the flow of power every four years or so. There's just no other way. We're not interested in seeing the Democrats in power forever any more than we're interested in seeing a bunch of conservative, greedy, hypocritical fucks pulling the American strings forever.

Of course, if we find ourselves in a position four to eight years from now where our choice is between advocating the continuation of Democratic corruption, or ushering in a new Republican regime to clean up that corruption while they happily reaffirm and implement their religious right agenda, then our decision will be much more difficult (and may include fleeing the country). But for now, given the set of circumstances we find ourselves in, any person who supports basic civil liberties and who wants to change what's been going on for the past eight years needs to fucking vote for Obama. Period.

Thomas Jefferson is credited with suggesting that "Every generation needs a new revolution." Tongue-in-cheek or not, it's a salient point: leave any one individual, entity, or regime in power long enough, and the corruption becomes so entrenched that it's quickly a permanent fixture of the entire system, rather than just that one participant. Fixing the problems brought on by two terms of Bushco is going to take people who have a vested interest in actually fixing those problems — someone from another party has that interest, and someone from within the same party has much less reason.

So for fuck's sake: stop this absurd, whiny pouting. Voting is not the same as cheerleading. This is not about getting your favorite fairy tale hero into office, it's about getting that fucking fairy tale villain and his cronies out. You're not voting for Steve McQueen over James Garner — they both get captured anyway — you're voting for all the boys escaping from the German POW camp. Stop treating presidential elections like you treat the elections for fucking prom queen.

The Two-Party System is bad enough. Wake the fuck up, and realize that if that's the only system we've got, then it's about your actual well-being, not your latest political crush. Then tear down your Teen Beat posters of Hillary "Duff" Clinton, grow some fucking brains, and stop that insane asshat McCain from stealing the election from that milquetoast asshat Obama. Understand?

You fucking idiots.

Both Hillary and Barack are too conservative for my tastes, but good God (may He rest in peace), how thick (or immoral) do you have to be to vote for four more years of the train wreck that is the modern Republican Party? These jackboots have trashed the Constitution, the Geneva Conventions, FISA, the military, the judiciary, FEMA (well, most agencies of the federal government, actually), the budget, the economy, the environment, and even managed to make a couple of Middle Eastern countries more backward and volatile and hateful toward the US (and you thought it wasn't possible). It's as though they hate America, all the other countries, and the planet itself.

People are welcome to complain about the two-party system, but given the winner-takes-all voting in this country (as opposed to a parliamentary system), it's always going to be a two-party system. Some third party in the future may manage to displace one of the existing two parties, but that will just set up a new duopoly. The electoral math is simple--a third party can only ever displace an existing party (almost impossible, but it's happened before, and the right kind of electoral mood swing could happen again) or ensure the victory of the existing party that hangs together best.

Since this is our de facto system, if you really want to effect political change, pick the major party closest to your ideals and hijack them from within. The religionistas did it with the Republican Party. If the Democrats would figure out that they don't have anything to lose by not pandering to the type of folks that listen to Coast to Coast AM and The 700 Club, maybe they could be hijacked by the sensible bloc of American voters.

I'm not exactly holding my breath for that, but I don't see how I could bring myself to vote Republican anytime soon, even if the Democrats waddle back into the corruption of, say, the Rostenkowski era. Primaries exist for just such a situation. And in any case, the modern Republican Party is so enamored of magical thinking and authoritarianism, I think they're just more likely to be corrupted. Religion is, after all, the original special pleading. "Forgive us our sins, oh lord, so we can go out and sin some more." If you live in fantasyland on Sunday, you're more likely to be out of touch with reality the rest of the week.

Wow. A new rant. Yeah, right on, I pretty much agree with the above statement 100%, though with less passion. I find myself caring less and less about whether this country heads for the shitter or not nowadays, or the whole world for that matter. I'm like the guy who has finally snapped and begun to laugh at his incredibly shitty situation. Not just because of recent politics, but from humanity's seemingly endless ability to make the shittiest decisions and maximize unnecessary suffering all of the way down to the everyday personal decisions. Take the invention of "naughty" words for example. We have a government fucking organization that partially devotes its time to handing out fines to television and radio stations that use these words. Amazing yes? Doesn't sound to strange. Even those of us that disagree with it and think that its stupid aren't surprised, but if you really put into perspective the resources wasted vs. the "crime" and the fact that somebody, or actually, most people, think that this makes sense somehow. Great yeah?

I can't remember the original source of this idea, but there are only two rational responses to the universe--to laugh or to cry. Might as well laugh at it.

Still, some places manage to get it more right than others. Doesn't seem like New Zealand or Norway (among others) are constantly fucking over themselves or others. Well, not lately, anyhow. But there's a certain paranoia at work in America that's poisoning everything we touch. Dick Cheney is the personification of this pathology. Small wonder he cut his teeth in the deeply paranoid Nixon administration. It's pretty much a straight line from the House Unamerican Activities Committee to present-day warrantless wiretapping, rendition, and torture. Not sure if this is what FDR was talking about, but I'm sure afraid of the Bush administration's fear.

I remember nearly eight years ago when Ralph Nader was running as a Greens candidate and the Democrats were pissed that he was stealing their votes.

In the end, a Republican ended up as President. I wondered at the time about a bunch of stuff: Why does the electoral college exist? Why in the twenty-first century can't the people be trusted to elect a president themselves? How in the Western world can anyone be elected without a majority vote?

It appears to my untrained un-American eyes that American voters put more faith in tradition than what a modern democracy is meant to be. That is, what the founding fathers came up with as far as a Presidential election shouldn't be refined.

I, personally would like to see the electoral college ditched and a run-off for a majority instituted. It seems to me that it would prevent this sort of scenario happening - I don't imagine a great many Clinton supporters would continue any sort of 'protest vote' if they saw that McCain was in sight of the White House.

Mind you, out here we see anything as being preferable to the Cheney Bush presidency.

The electoral college, IIRC, started with the original colonies, and was designed to keep very populous states with different interests from completely overwhelming smaller states. I think it has some appeal on paper, but recent practice has me favoring election by straight majority vote. I think we can discuss dropping the original compromise by now.

I think the Electoral College was originally put in place for a few reasons. One was to act as a hedge against the tyranny of the majority, as Bronze Dog mentions--the number of electors is based on the number of representatives and senators, so less populous states have a bit of an edge, just like in congress. Another reason was to act as a brake on popular passions. The Electoral College meets weeks after the election and thus provides a cooling off period in case the electorate "makes a mistake". And finally, in the age before telephones, travel time precluded an immediate count of the popular vote in any case, so it was another example of representative democracy.

I don't personally find any of these reasons compelling, and I think this is one case where the Founders were overly cautious. Originally Senators were also elected via the Electoral College, but we fixed that with an amendment to the Constitution. I don't know why they didn't make the same fix to the presidential vote at that time, but it's clearly long since time to eliminate the Electoral College.

Nader's big mistake was not being able to see that there actually is quite a large difference between the Dems and Reps. Sure, they're both in the pockets of special interests, but one party is far more likely to start unnecessary wars than the other. They have much different views about how to turn a profit for their corporate masters. Nader thought that just having corporate masters was the problem. It's a problem, not the problem. Magical thinking is the problem. A corporate-owned state can still make rational decisions. Magical thinkers rarely can.

I know somebody who is was a very vehement Clinton supporter who now refuses to vote for Obama, citing "Lack of experience!" and how one time he flubbed and said that there's 57 states.

Nothing can convince her that he's still a far better candidate than McCain, that his stances are almost completely in line with Hillary's, and that even Hillary recognizes this and wants him as president instead of McCain. She was so attached to the horse she originally backed that she can't even swallow her pride and vote for Obama instead of the raging insanity that is the McCain ticket.

It's all I can do not to scream in her face and call her a fucking moron. When will these assholes get with it and understand what's at stake? Their pathetic little whiny no-vote-I-love-Hillary protest is pointless.

I know somebody else who is honestly mulling over voting for McCain because in four years time when the country is even worse off, Hillary will look even better. And I thought I was cynical.

What experience does she think Hillary has? Does she think that being the wife of the president makes one qualified to be president? I mean, seriously, what is the reasoning there? "Hillary lived in the White House before, so she knows where all the wall outlets are"? I admit I am wee bit concerned about Obama's lack of experience, but I still see that he is way better than McCain. It's like what Hamlet says about how fear makes us rather bear those ills we have than to fly to others we know not of. Well, let's hope that kind of fear doesn't prevail this time. Sure, Obama MIGHT mess things up but we KNOW McCain will!

Sigh...I guess my reply is still in SPAM filter limbo....

Sure, Obama MIGHT mess things up but we KNOW McCain will!

This is what I've been trying to tell people for months. Even if Obama fucks up everything he's promised, at least his promises aren't diametrically opposed to my views, like pretty well all of McCain's. I'd rather vote for the guy who has a chance of doing some good over the one who will almost assuredly continue the current malignancy.

I think it just sucks that we have to choose between a shit sandwich and a turdscicle. Whoever wins has to swear to uphold a document neither has read as evidenced by the question "When does a fetus gain human rights":

Obama: That's above my pay grade.
McCain: At conception.

Well, it's "at birth" according to the 14th Amendment. You'd think Obama especially would've known that one.