The tumult and the shouting dies;
The captains and the kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget - lest we forget!
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Recessional, by Kipling
Here in the last throes of the Presidential campaign, this seems appropriate:
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3 comments:
As a Canadian who went through an entire election cycle within a portion of the time allocated to your American one, I find your election fascinating.
I'm Libertarian (or non-big-government Republican) at heart (ish) and yet I've found the tone of McCain's campaign to be too negative for my taste. Some of the slurs and allegation against Mr. Obama are just mean-spirited and inaccurate.
Obama does come across to me as a very smart fellow. That might help with some types of issue. On the other hand, he seems willing to mess with NAFTA so I'm hoping this ends up being the election promise that he wisely does not keep once reaching office.
I'm also horrified by the level of racism the idea of a black president evokes. Canada is not without its racists, but I'm always shocked by their appearance. And the sort of public expression of those sentiments in contravention of any sort of logic is always jarring. America is supposed to be the land of opportunity. A black president, a japanese president, a female president... these will all eventually prove that if they are allowed to come to pass. Heck, an Arapaho president, a Quaker president, etc. would be interesting. Why should just white rich academics or oilmen get the job?
Maybe this will also ratchet down the level of security theater going on down in the USA. Every time the gov't makes some incredibly ineffective change to borders, all it does is deter tourism and business travel and that hurts everyone involved. And I'm fairly sure Osama isn't coming in with a hard drive full of AQ plans anytime soon...
Nice quotation.
The racism goes both ways, I'm afraid. I have elderly relatives who are Democrats to the core but they voted McCain, and I'm pretty sure it's because Obama is black. But I also have black acquaintances who are voting for Obama purely because he's black. (If you say "Are you voting for Obama because he's pro-life?" and they say "yes!", that's a clue they have zero idea what his actual policies are).
I also know of a couple of instances in which the News Story{tm} said "people were yelling Slur A" or "the crowd laughed and cheered when Candidate A mentioned from stage that Candidate B was ill". However, people who were actually there said no such thing happened. Draw your own conclusions.
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