Election Day...or Something

This is history in the making! As many of you already know, yesterday was Election Day here in Oregon. After endless months of inane commercials and mind-numbing television coverage, the votes are finally in and counted. I suppose the results were a foregone conclusion; what with everyone talking about voting for change, for shaking up the establishment. It’s probably no wonder that things went they way they did. Yep, after millions and millions of votes, Kristi Yamaguchi won Dancing with the Stars.

Okay, seriously, I cannot help but wonder if this last season of Dancing with the Stars is more interesting and important to the future of the nation than the current political pig-wrestling contest. When our choices are limited to Left, Lefter, and Leftest, I feel as though it hardly matters whose chad I dimple this November.

So where have all the conservatives gone? I’m still here, dying for some representation. Why is it that the politicians are worried about disenfranchising every voter but me? Call me crazy, but I doubt I’m the only one feeling this way. Hosts of conservatives are crying out for someone to stand up and fight for what we believe in. But wait, didn’t Mitt Romney do just that? He did, and we told him to take a flying leap. And now we are left with Mr. McCain, a man who had his conservative gland surgically removed two decades ago. Now conservatives complain that McCain isn’t conservative enough. Well, why should he be? We’ve known for years that he was a playmate of the Democrats, wrapped in the now-faded shroud of Reaganism. Arizona has had opportunities aplenty to rid themselves of his pseudo-conservatism, and passed on every chance. (Lefties often use the term “Neo-con” to denigrate conservatives, though none seem to know what the phrase means. I’m happy to have coined the, I hope, soon to be famous moniker “Pseudo-con”. It fits McCain better than anything else I’ve heard.) We’ve shown that we won’t support an actual Reaganite, so in my opinion, we have brought this pestilent curse upon ourselves and when the political locusts devour our crop of national prosperity, we will only have ourselves to blame for shooing away the seagulls of conservatism.

Now that you know how I feel about our presumptive nominee, let me get one more thing off my chest. Just because I belong to the Republican Party (for now, at least), and just because I abhor the thought of a Clinton or Obama presidency, I am not duty-bound to vote for McCain! I am obligated to vote for the person who represents my values, my goals, my morals. I would much rather people thought that I sold out the Republican Party by not voting for McCain than feel that I had sold out everything I hold precious for the sake of a political party that now seems to mock those very principles. If I am told by one more person that it is my responsibility as a Republican to vote for John McCain, then the time will have come for the Republican Party and me to go our separate ways. “Republican Party,” I will say in a kind but firm voice, “we’ve been through a lot together, and had some good times. But I’m not happy anymore. You aren’t the Party I joined ten years ago, and it’s like I don’t even know you anymore. I want a divorce. But you can keep the furniture.”

Although we have several months before the national elections roll around and make us wish those darned Greeks had given up on democracy altogether, I have little hope for what’s in store for our nation. In four years, I expect our once magnificent country will little resemble its current condition. We may all be speaking Spanish. Or Chinese. Or the good ole’ U.S. of A. may have been reduced to a smoking crater. Whatever happens, don’t blame me; I voted for Kristi Yamaguchi.