fearlesstemp | (no subject)

I used to be more into and aware of politics than I am now -- the 2000 Election pretty much burned me out, really, and I kind of cut myself off from my then-obsessive NYTimes online reading and 24-hour news watching, etc., mostly because I kind of felt like the government had been hijacked, and since I'd done my best -- voting, attending rallies, etc. -- along with the rest of the country, really, to keep what happened from happening, I had to let things go. And so I don't follow the news as closely or as well as I probably should. After the Supreme Court came down with their decision, I pretty much gave up. Which is not to say I was completely bitter; I actually took a lot of comfort in the fact that the American people, for the most part, agreed with me. If Bush had to be in office, this would have been the way I wanted him to go in: Without having been truly elected by the people.

I wonder if other people were affected by that election hullabaloo as I was -- it still feels like a profound betrayal, and I can't get past it, so that whenever I discuss Bush with anyone, I usually end up resorting to screaming in a shrill voice "BUT HE WASN'T EVEN REALLY ELECTED!" and, well, screaming shrilly never wins one points in any debate. And so I don't know as much about the War Thang as I probably should, though it seems to me to be a bad idea. But on a more basic level, I just don't trust Bush and his Administration as far as I can throw him, and I don't think that will ever go away. With Clinton, I may not have agreed with everything he did, but I did have a basic faith in his intelligence and his abilities such that I could trust his decisions most of the time. I don't feel that way now. I don't trust the president at all; in fact, most of the time think him to be rather stupid. Whenever I see him giving a speech, I still kind of expect Peter Funt to come out of my closet and point me toward the camera hidden in the mini-bean bag Grover on my dresser, telling me that this has been one long, elaborate episode of Candid Camera.

Anyway. That said. (And what exactly was said? I'm not sure myself.) Here's a link to an Onion Article that came out right before Bush assumed the presidency. It was funny at the time but is eerily prophetic reading it now:

Bush: Our Long National Nightmare of Peace and Prosperity Is Finally Over