sick and tired ...

seriously, i am sick and tired. i think i picked something else babysitting the other day. i have a bad soar throat, and a constant drip in the nose. but that didn't keep me from watching the third and final debate.

a couple of things struck me tonight. and both, as funny as it may seem, simply insure that i will not be voting for kerry. and i say that's funny because i feel that bush won these debates.

i was watching nightline earlier. and during the analysis of the debates, someone said something about how the important question in the recent history of presidential debates had been the old "who would you rather have a beer with?" and i agree, i felt in 2000 that bush had won the debates because he seemed cool to me, and gore seemed like a loser.

now, i still threw my vote away on gore, but it was only because i felt that bush had done so well in the debates that if i didn't, bush could possibly win california -- i know, i was dellusional. but the point is just that said question seemed to be the benchmark on the race.

and the commentator on nightline said that this was no longer the question of the race. and i agree with that too. not that i thought i would like to have a beer with bush. i thought that bush looked as retarded as ever.

in fact, i felt that bush had come with only a few predetermined arguments, and that he was determined to use them no matter what kerry said. kerry wasn't much different, he just had a lot more to draw on, and more planned and concise direction. and i think that was key, for him.

so i know, it sounds like i am kissing the man's ass. and that's what i mean by i thought it was funny that i would find so much fault with kerry.

the first thing he did (and won on): kerry pushed forth his notion of health care reform, and he did so with details -- something quite uncommon in politics. of course, he didn't have a lot of details, and i remain convinced that no one really has anything planned for action if they should win ... at least not that they would normally admit to.

and kerry offered as evidence something that i think we all know, or at least should know: that the united states is the only industrialized nation without socialized health care. and this is fucking stupid. how can we really look at the world and claim leadership when we refuse to take care of our own people?

but kerry is so consumed with making himself look mainstream that he cannot, and would not, support any sort of step. no, though the solution seems to be screaming his own logic in the face, he just isn't hearing it.

and this is the most grave of the concerns about kerry. the man doesn't seem to ever follow his own logic to its natural conclusion. it seems like he is just a step away from admitting that all health care should be socialized, and that the real problem with this "epidemic" is the overwhelming greed of the healthcare providers and the pharmaceutical companies.

and he does the same thing with his approach to the war in iraq. but i don't want to get into that again right now. i think that with any simple thought, one can realize that we need to be out of iraq post-haste. so, i would rather direct my attention to the war on terror.

and that's the second thing that kerry did tonight that struck me. kerry used the same line again that he has used in each of the two previous debates. he said "we will hunt and kill the terrorists." i can't even believe that it is acceptable that a person says this kind of thing about another human being -- i certainly can't believe that it would come from a person who claims to have so much admiration for his god.

i think that it is a line that kerry worked on for the debates. he wants to seem hard, but he comes off seeming silly to me. and i just don't think i can vote for someone that refuses to stand up to the president on the issue that i find most important.

and my main concern is this: i still don't believe that there is such a thing as the war on terror, and i think that many, many people see it just as i. whatever the motivation for all of this may be, it was going on long before 9/11, and it has almost nothing to do with terrorism, no matter how you wish to define the word.

either way. i am glad that it looks like kerry could win. i have to stick to my principals, because that's what i think that voting should be largely based on. of course, as with anything else, it's about what you have to do when it is time to do it. anyway, i am just saying that i would be a happier person if bush is not president next year -- even if things don't get better. after all, without bush, things won't get worse quite as fast.