Come, Tilt At Windmills With Me

It's hard for someone like me to endure a Presidential election without my head exploding, Scanners style.

When I was new to my party, I had the zeal of a convert. I was obnoxious. I'd found the Truth, and as soon as you heard about it you'd see the light and start spreading the news.
Much the way the occasional newly minted Christian thinks converting an infidel such as myself is just a matter of telling me the story.

Hopefully I've outgrown some of my obnoxiousness, but I've never outgrown my idealism. I hope I never do.




But here's the part that gets those of us on the Lunatic Fringe* frothing at the mouth:

You agree with us.

I truly believe a majority of Americans agree with me on almost every significant issue I hold an opinion on. Granted, the guy who agrees with me that taxing incomes is moronic, immoral and destructive is not the same person who agrees with me that the so-called War on Drugs is just Jim Crow masquerading as the new Temperance.

The person who shares my belief that borders should be open and immigration unrestricted is typically not the same person who agrees with me that health care needs to be fully privatized rather than further socialized.

The fellow traveler on the school voucher subject (who agrees with me that parents should have a choice about where and how there kids are educated, and that furthermore it's not primarily the state's responsibility to raise their children) is never, in my experience, the same person who agrees with me that marriage is just a contract between individuals and it's none of the state's business if the two people entering the contract have matching genitals.

And the guy who shares my view that the Second Amendment covers everything from handguns to aircraft carriers and even 'nukular' bombs can hardly be expected to be the same one who shares any of the above opinions.

But on any given point, I'll bet most of you are with me. And my fellow Libertarians.



And here's where our heads blow up: you'll nod your head and agree. You'll affirm these beliefs with your own anecdotes. And you'll get in that voting booth and forget all about it and vote for one of the assholes who pissed you off so badly you wanted to expatriate to a country you'd never heard of.

So I went for a yard sign and a couple of bumper stickers. This is out of character for me, only the second yard sign I've put up in my life. My boss has been selling Obama signs for five bucks with great success: he's sold something like 20,000 of them. Which bears out my prediction that, regrettably, Obama is the next President of the United States, but my usual reaction is to say Yes, I'll let you put a sign in my yard, but not for five bucks. You gotta give me twenty, minimum.



I suppose the fact that my lawn has gone to seed discredits my little political statement. Just like I suppose the bumper stickers are discredited by me being to lazy to take Goo-Gone to Mo's Crayola graffiti on my car.

Yes, I'm tilting at windmills, but I invite you to join me. All it takes is for half of the people who step into a voting booth on November 3 to come to their senses and realize that Republocrats and Depublicans are what got things so screwed up. And for them to notice there's a third option staring them in the face, a candidate who did not create this mess and has some good ideas for how to get things back to right.


*We must be the Lunatic Fringe because Bob Barr has not been allowed to participate in the Presidential debates, despite being on the ballot in all fifty states. And Root has not been allowed to participate in the Vice Presidential debate while the dubious if lovely Sarah Palin was. So even though Barr could technically be the next President of the United States, you can't have him weigh in on the issues and make his case to the people. They might get the wrong idea and vote for someone who's not part of the two-party system that fucked things up so badly.