AMERICAN POLITICS FOR THE EURO ZONE

[tencrush]

This:



Scares the SHIT out of me. Her especially. The idea that these two might actually be elected is enough to make me REALLY REALLY QUESTION our decision to move to SF. PLEASE, SOMEONE TELL ME THAT THIS ISN'T GOING TO HAPPEN. PLEASE. I get this powerless feeling of dread every four years, much as I expect other Europeans do. All you can do is just sit and watch while your jaw drops onto the floor at the fact that FUCKING FRIGHTENING gun-toting, fundamentalist, freaky deaky WEIRDOES like this even have a VOICE in that big ole country over there, let alone can stand as candidates for the most powerful job in the world.

Listen, I know loads of Americans, and they're all decent, intelligent, hard-working, perfectly normal people. I lived there. People were normal. And nice. And sane. Those two up there? Their very existence? It's what makes us Europeans look at your country and assume you're all trigger-happy, pro-life, religious zealout, war mongering HICKS who haven't got a brain cell between you. And all we can do is sit here once every four years and shout at you and say PLEASE DON'T ELECT THESE PEOPLE. What the fuck else are we supposed to do? See all those caps up there, I'm trying to express frustration here, because I really, honestly don't know what else to do. The idea that these two even stand a TINY CHANCE of becoming the two most powerful people in the world, not only does it scare me to death, but it's just a fact that I cannot, intellectually, get my head around. It doesn't compute.

Please tell me this isn't happening. Help a non-citizen out here.

Comments

[antelope-writes.livejournal.com]

Forget Gov. Palin's experience, policies, lack thereof, whatever.

The fact that he chose this person is a really damning indictment of his decision-making skills and an even worse indictment of his staff. If you work for somebody who you *know* is a loose cannon, it's your job to reel him in before he does something stupid.

And if you are interviewing for a job that frequently requires great delicacy, subtlety, and forethought, and you regularly make gut decisions that aren't well-thought-out (and admittedly have a quick temper), it doesn't matter to me if you proclaim proudly that yes, you shoot from the hip, but you follow through. You still made a spur-of-the-moment, dumbass decision. If this is indicative of how he plans to run the country, making poorly-researched decisions on really important things, the US is in diep kak if he wins.

[tencrush]

I tried to listen to his RNC speech, but I just can't listen to the man speak. He's awful.

[antelope-writes.livejournal.com]

He admitted he's better at off-the-cuff speaking than planned speeches, to the point where the RNC reconfigured the stage to have more of that feel.

If anything, that makes it even more obvious that he isn't the kind of person who can do long prepwork for something important.

Meanwhile:
http://www.samefacts.com/archives/campaign_2008_/2008/09/slogans_for_democrats.php#comments

[tencrush]

the RNC reconfigured the stage to have more of that feel
I think the fact that he was standing in front a big blue background and looked like he was going to be cut out and superimposed somewhere else didn't really help. I gave up after a few minutes because he just seemed to be blurting out random sentences as opposed to actually giving a speech.

Are you an expat? Will you be voting?

[antelope-writes.livejournal.com]

I'm an expat with complications. I live (on paper) in NZ, but am working back in the US for 5 months on an extended contract. Just to muddy things up more, I work offshore and right before I left NZ for the contract, I packed all my stuff up into a storage unit. So I'm officially homeless and working on a ship.

I'm going to make every effort to vote absentee, but I have a feeling that I'm going to get shut out.

[tencrush]

Yeah, they don't make absentee voting very easy, but as a citizen you should be entitled to it, in the federal election anyway. Just keep badgering them :)

[antelope-writes.livejournal.com]

There is a lot that is difficult about being a US citizen expat (don't get me started on taxes, for one), but yes. I plan to poke and prod and badger as best as I can.

Is it bad to say that I'm expecting to not be able to vote, and would be pleasantly surprised if I were?

[love-jackianto.livejournal.com]

Good luck trying to vote.