After more than a year of bickering, the 2004 Presidential Election is finally over. As expected,
there was a huge turnout. It was great news that more people were involved in this year's
election, even if many of the under 25 voters can't name the Vice President or find
America on a world map. The best line I heard from a voter on Tuesday came from a woman in
Ohio who said something along the lines of "I have to vote. It's the only way to make the
commercials stop." I can't imagine what it must have been like to be in Ohio or Florida this
year.
Based on historical averages, the election was fairly close. Based on the 2000 results and
expectations, it really wasn't. For the first time since 1992, people really seemed to
care who won. Despite my couch sores from the baseball playoffs, I watched about seven hours
of election night coverage, flipping between FOX News, MSNBC and CNN.
- MSNBC probably had the best coverage of the night. Chris Matthews was uncharacteristically
subdued. This was a far cry from the week before when Matthews doted all over Bill Clinton
upon the former President's first return to public life following his heart surgery. Matthews
compared Clinton to Lazarus coming out of the tomb and commented "Ooooh, he's sooo thin."
He sounded like a teenage girl seeing Justin Timberlake for the first time. It was priceless.
- FOX's coverage provided some of the best comedy of the night. Brit Hume simply couldn't
subtract to get the actual difference in votes between Bush and Kerry. He always seemed
to be off by either 10,000 or 100,000. FOX frequently cut away from the panel to visit
with their poll specialist (whose name now escapes me). This man seemed to be stifling
belches and coughs all night long. Then there was the impossibly annoying-voiced Susan
Estrich who repeatedly predicted Kerry comebacks. The LA Clippers should use her this season
when they fall ten games behind in the playoff race.
- CNN easily won the battle of the graphics, but little else. It was amusing late in the
night when CNN absolutely refused to give Ohio to Bush. Even when the President moved
ahead by 150,000 votes with 99% of precints reporting, CNN dubbed Ohio "Too Close to Call."
In fact, I think they still have the 2000 election as "Too Close to Call."
I was also worried about Larry King. He was still there at 4:00 am EST and I assumed that he
needed to back in the coffin before the first sunlight.
- I didn't check in with CBS, but I assume that Dan Rather was sobbing uncontrollably by the end of
the night.
I give John Kerry credit for not challenging the 150,000 vote difference in Ohio. Many of
his supporters wanted him to dispatch the lawyers (all I can think of is the flying
monkeys from the Wizard of Oz). Kerry and Edwards should be credited for not entertaining
the sore loserism and grassy knoll theories that we've seen in the past. That's a good
lesson for a country whose citizens seem to fire up a lawsuit every time something
doesn't go their way.
Within a day of the election, Susan Sarandon was complaining that the election was rigged. She
was babbling something about 3,000 miscounted votes in Ohio. Apparently, she didn't get the news
that her guy lost that state by 150,000 and the country by almost four million. Sarandon's comments
are the equivalent of saying that the Patriots lost Superbowl XX (Bears 46 Patriots 10) because of
a bogus holding penalty.
Now that John Kerry has lost the election, maybe he can attempt to become a real Red Sox fan rather than
simply pretending to be one for political gain. I still don't know who Kerry was talking about when he
referred to "Manny Ortiz" but whoever he is, he sounds like a heck of a hitter.
Apparently, several Hollywood actors said that they would leave the country if Bush won the
election. All I can say is, "do you need a ride to the airport?" John Kerry may have damaged
his chances of winning the election by aligning himself with the Hollywood and music industry elites.
It's one thing to appear with the mild-mannered and patriotic Bruce Springsteen. It's
quite another to align oneself with the likes of Whoopi "Zero Class" Goldberg, Cameron "Cradle
Robber" Diaz, Susan "I'm his wife not his mother" Sarandon, Sean "Saddam used me as a prop" Penn,
Alec "Repuplican politicians should be stoned to death" Baldwin and Sean "P Dopey" Combs. I heard
an interview where Combs claimed to be a "disenfranchised voter." It quickly became obvious that he
didn't know what the word "disenfranchised" meant.
I would have paid anything to be in the room with billionaire George Soros as the election
results rolled in. Soros spent something on the order of $25 million to defeat President
Bush in this election. As a Bush supporter, I don't take any pleasure in the disappointment of
Kerry supporters, but I do take enormous pleasure in the frustration of arrogant billionaire elites
like Soros who think they are more important than the voters. Soros, in case you don't know, was born in
Hungary, moved to America when he was 26, made billions thanks to the American way and now spends every
waking hour bashing our country's foreign policy. Soros would probably be earning $1 an hour in some
Hungarian slum if not for America. "Despicable ingrate" is the best phrase that I can come up with.
Michael Moore might claim otherwise, but he must be the happiest guy in the world right now.
The Bush victory gives Moore the opporuntity for more books, more movies, more lies and more cheeseburgers
over the next four years. I'm fine with the fact that Michael Moore hates President Bush. Those people
are a dime a dozen. What separates Moore from the rest, other than his ability to completely ingore factual
information, is his complete disdain for America, the American people and the US Armed Forces
(July 18th Notes on Moore).
In fact, Osama Bin Laden's speech last week sounded very much like a Michael Moore speech.
I thought I would give you a chance to see if you could tell the difference. Below are seven
quotes from either Moore or Bin Laden. See if you can guess which America-hater they came from.
The answers are at the bottom of this page.
- "Despite entering the fourth year after September 11, Bush is still deceiving you and hiding the
truth from you."
- "[George H. W. Bush] passed on tyranny and oppression to his son, and they called it the Patriot
Act, under the pretext of fighting terror."
- "The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not 'insurgents' .. They are the Revolution
.. and their numbers will grow, and they will win."
- "It never occurred to us that the commander in chief .. would leave 50,000 citizens in the
two towers to face these horrors alone .. because he thought listening to a child discussing
her goat .."
- "[Americans] must now sacrifice their children until enough blood has been let that maybe, just maybe
.. the Iraqi people will forgive [America]."
- "[George H. W. Bush] did well placing his sons as governors and did not forget to pass on the expertise
in fraud .. to Florida to use it in critical moments."
- "The motivation for war is simple. The U.S. government started the war with Iraq in order to make it
easy for U.S. corporations to do business in other countries. They intend to use cheap labor in those
countries, which will make Americans rich."
The only thing worse than the Hollywood elites is the smarmy Europeans. One viewpoint that I absolutely
cannot respect is the one which states that America's reputation in the world needs to be restored. America
does not need to apologize to the world (I am quite comfortable calling the French and Germans "EuroTrash")
for removing from a power one of the most prolific mass murderers since Hitler. Americans
have the right to question whether or not American troops should go to war. Whiny European
or North American countries consumed by jealousy who are not commiting troops to the
mission have absolutely no right to criticize. If they want to side with a dictator, that is
their business, but they should keep their cowardly, corrupt mouths shut. If they say anything,
it should be a thank you to America for putting an end to the Hussein Family's reign or terror.
The United Nations, specifically the French, should be apologizing to the Iraqi people for helping
Saddam rip them off using the Oil for Food Program.
The headline on the front page of Thursday's edition of Britain's Daily Mirror newspaper read
"How can 59,054,087 people be so DUMB?" Yes, England, we Americans are dumb. So dumb that our government's
leadership includes a Queen. Oh wait, that's you. Now I've got it. We're so dumb that we cannot
solve the problem of dental hygiene. No, that's you again. Give me time and I'll figure it out. I'm
DUMB after all. The headline has proven to be great publicity for the magazine. People around the globe
are contacting the Daily Mirror and asking for a copy of the cover including some Americans who
wouldn't know individual or national pride if it hit them in the face.
If there is a third group, in addition to the Hollywood elites and the EuroTrash, that I'd love to shut
out of the American public's political discussion over the next four years, it is the Ivy League and MIT
professors. I am so disgusted by these "intellectuals" poisoning the minds of American college students.
My guess is that seven out of ten Ivy League professors have a more favorable opinion of Adolf Hitler
than George W. Bush (this isn't even a joke). It's only getting worse. Over the past three years, there has
probably been more anti-American sentiment coming out of Columbia University than Tehran.
I read a post from a guy on the ESPN Red Sox Message Board who was complaining because
Curt Schilling endorsed President Bush. He claimed that Schilling had "ruined" what he had
"waited his whole life for" (the Red Sox World Series Championship). I'm sure this whiny loser
wasn't bothered at all when John Henry, Tom Werner and Theo Epstein publicly backed John Kerry.
I myself couldn't care less who these three men support for President. They are a great
management team who delivered a World Series Championship to Boston and I will always be
grateful. If Henry, Werner and Epstein want to act as toadies for Kerry, it won't bother me one
bit as long as they continue building winning baseball teams. The wimp on the ESPN Message Board
should extend the same courtesy to Curt Schilling who put his career on the line to win a World
Series.
QUIZ ANSWERS: 1. Bin Laden, 2. Bin Laden, 3. Moore, 4. Bin Laden, 5. Moore, 6. Bin Laden, 7. Moore
