What I Want, What I Expect, What I Need to Know

At last, I’ve voted in a presidential primary (my former state didn’t allow me to as a registered Independent). And for the first time, I’ve seen all of the candidates on television. Had no idea Romney was so handsome. What I expect: HRC’s people will start playing really dirty. I PRAY Obama and his folks can keep to the high road - and that they do more education among lower income, Asian, and Latino people. I’m curious about the Latino landslide for Clinton.

Rant: Why are voting places so random? We vote at least every two years - why do the locations change? That is some pretty oppressive crap right there. It puts the poor, elderly, and car-less at a real disadvantage.

Thank you, Cheezus, for the Romney/Huckabee split - and I hope it lasts so that McCain can easily secure the nomination. I wish Ron Paul had been more of a player; he was the Republican party’s Kucinich in the sense that they just pushed him to the side repeatedly. Unfortunate; of all the Republicans, I would have voted for him. I might have even voted him over Clinton. As it was, we didn’t even get to see his Super Tuesday speech to his supporters. No mention of him at all in any of the three hours of coverage I watched. What a pathetic state of affairs.

Other random points:

And I’ve told the LH that he needs to register to vote. Although he’s more informed about politics than I am, he has never voted in his life. If we’re going to have kids, we definitely need to be more involved in our local and state politics.
The touchscreen display used on CNN to show the tallies was pretty awesome.
It doesn’t surprise me that Obama is winning San Francisco - his tech plan is very good. He’s the only candidate that even has a tech plan. Creating a CTO position in the Cabinet, and putting all of the government’s budget information online (for free) is one of those “Doh!” things that no one else seems to think is relevant.
And now I’m remembering why I stopped watching tv news: it’s so unhelpful. This whole night there hasn’t been a single mention of when the votes from the other states (like mine) will be tallied and registered - they haven’t even mentioned which other states have yet to vote. What kind of weird oversight. This truly is “the news” - apparently I just have to “stay tuned” if I want to know what happens next in the presidential race. Way to be informative, CNN! (And Fox - where they commented on Clinton winning California despite the Kennedy endorsement of Obama, but failed to mention that California had early voting.)
Romney putting so much of his own money into his race was foolish - if people aren’t giving you their money, they aren’t invested in you; and you will hear less from them - clearly this guy was out of touch.

Comments

6 Responses to “What I Want, What I Expect, What I Need to Know”

sarahliz on February 6th, 2008 11:37 am

Out of curiosity what appealed to you about Ron Paul? I haven’t really followed his platform much at all but a lot of my friends seem to think he’s a serious nutcase.
Jess on February 6th, 2008 1:29 pm

CNN is seriously flawed when it comes to election coverage — try MSNBC next time as they have much more balanced, and factual analysis. And Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann, who are both awesome enough to negate Chris Matthews.
hafidha sofia on February 7th, 2008 7:27 pm

Sarahliz - I appreciate his consistent advocacy for civil liberties - incl. the fact that he likely pissed off Republicans when he voted against the Patriot Act, the Iraq War, surveillance, and torture. When it comes to energy and the environment, he is for more innovation for alternative sources, and holding polluters financially responsible for the damage they do. Like me, he is against the Federal Reserve, and sees the need for serious education reform (his solution is to abolish the federal oversight of it, which I think would only be a good idea in a much more equal society than we have now; however, I must concede the current system is failing miserably at providing equitable education to all children - and he has a PLAN for phasing out the DoE, which is actually reasonable). In short, I like his free thinking, his refusal to be in the pocket of corporations, and his goals of simpler government. I disagree with him on a lot of things, but I find him to be both knowledgeable and trustworthy.

p.s. I don’t know why your friends think he is a nutcase; but it could have to do with him being Libertarian (running as a Republican). I’ve found that a lot of my liberal friends think Libertarians are insane. I merely see them as being naive or uncaring. But Ron Paul is neither of these; his ideas are ineffective as sound bites, but I’d suggest to anyone that they actually listen to his talks about his ideas. I may have a libertarian streak because I don’t think federal government can/should solve all our problems. I do, however, think its primary tasks should be to ensure those few words in our Preamble:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America

To my mind, that means a legal system that is fair and just, provides basic health services and (yes, even) education, defense, a stable economic system, and probably oversight of things like roads, sanitation, drinkable water, utilities (these should not be privatized at all!), policing and fire departments. I might have left out a few things, but don’t want to go on forever!
Comrade Kevin on February 7th, 2008 7:38 pm

As someone already commented, MSNBC’s coverage was far superior, far more on the ball, far more informative, and far quicker to correctly call states for each candidate.

On MSNBC.com the live video feed combined with internet updates of how each state voted was super cool.
hafidha sofia on February 7th, 2008 7:41 pm

Okay, next time I’ll tell the LH to tune in to MSNBC instead. I was just appalled by CNN - and don’t get me started on Fox!
Justine on February 19th, 2008 3:36 pm

I know you posted this two weeks ago… but I just wanted to say that in Chicago the voting places never change…. aside from unforeseen circumstances.

and I like that Illinois you just show up on the day of the vote and ask for either a republican or democratic ballot, no registering with a party or any of that.