I must admit I did not watch much of the democratic primaries. But Al Gore had no trouble waltzing to the top of his party. In the Republican primaries, three main candidates were put before the public. I liked John McCain and Allen Keys would have been great if he had had any other platforms besides strengthening the countries morals. But in the end George “ The Exterminator” Bush got the go-ahead because he was a better politician (though that’s not always a good thing).
And they’re off! The race between Gush and Bore or Bore and Gush, as Ralph Nader put it, began. There also were many other candidates in the race. The only thing Palph Nader wanted to accomplish was to pull votes away from Gore and get enough percent of the vote to receive government supplied money for the next election (which he did not do). Another, Pat Loosecanan, switched from the Republican party to the troubled Reformed party just to be in the election. There also were many other interesting parties. The Constitution party (good but a little extreme), and the Socialist party (kinda creepy huh). But, as usual, the media (a very important part of politics) did a very good job of telling the American people how to vote. So Gore, Bush, and Nader were the only candidates we heard about.
Indeed, the candidates’ personalities ran the election. Much time was spent commenting on George “Dubya” Bush’s intelligence and Al Gore’s trustworthiness. Come on, cut them some slack. Bush is much smarter than he looks (or sounds) and Al Gore only has a slight problem with elaborating stories a little too much. But you have to admit, that’s all we had to talk about. Because, as strange as it may seem, they’re basically the same candidate. Besides health care and surplus spending ideas, they almost agreed about everything. The debates (which were deathly boring) were riddled with such phrases as “As Gov. Bush said....”, and, “I agree with the Vice President but....”. Algoreisms, as I like to call them, were especially prevalent in the debates. The constant sighing, exaggerating, and sarcasm probably hurt the Gore campaign more than anything else. The Bush campaign, desperate for some strength, made a major mistake when they ran an ad commenting on Democratic plans. During the ad, the word “Rats” flashed on the screen for a split second. Now would you trust someone who tries to send subliminal messages to run your country?
In the final stretches of the race the U.S. public realized one important thing, neither of these men deserve to be president. That, and the and the concentration of most of their campaigns to certain states such as Florida and New York, split the country down the middle. Election night was a sight to behold, though I didn’t stay up late into the wee morning hours only to find out that it won’t be decided upon for quite some time. I pity those who did. The main highlight of the night was the horrible job of the networks of predicting the states. Every station had a different amount of electoral votes for each candidate and the ping-pong game they played with Florida was downright foolish. Let me ask you this, didn’t we have the electoral college system in place in past elections? So how come people are just now noticing it? Another amazing thing about this election is that you can’t go anywhere without hearing someone talking about it. I think this was the first time we ever talked politics over Thanksgiving.
The Sore/Loserman campaign is trying to steal the election with the constant recounting and they actually might end up doing so. Doesn’t it seem strange how every time they recount, Bush’s lead reduces? All of this legislation and a lame-duck president leaves the country very weak and vulnerable and may start some ugly fighting. One looming possibility is that there will be no one decided upon by inauguration day. Whoever does get elected, they will probably only have a one term presidency. Also, with the senate and the house being balanced between Republicans and Democrats, the person who wins will have a very tough job of getting anything done. Many people have said that this election will be remembered for years to come, but I don’t think it will be remembered in a good way. The whole U.S. just wants it to be over. Yes, this election is going to go down in history. But, then again, it matters what your definition of “is” is.
(Don’t tell anybody, but Ralph Nader actually won)