Election Reflection

If the stakes weren't so high, I could have been mightily amused by this year's election run-up. Sometimes it seemed like an extended Saturday Night Live skit. I mean, from back in the days when SNL was funny. Consider:

• When will Keith Olbermann's handlers get him that badly-needed distemper shot?


• Was Chris Matthews certain his leg was tingling for Obama, or was it time to shop for Depends?


• Where was John Edwards? Couldn't he tear himself away from the baby-supplies catalogs long enough to provide welcome comic relief?


• Fascinating as Sarah Palin's campaign wardrobe allowance was, I couldn't help wondering about other moneys, like $700,000,000 in donations from the likes of Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and anonymous Middle Eastern sources.


• Apparently the old "This Is Your Life" television show is being revived. In its new incarnation, the contestant asks a policy question of a political candidate, then has his personal life examined and publicized for national consumption. In the bonus rounds, government workers illegally access records to sift for embarrassing information on the contestant.

In local news, no surprises, except for the passage of Proposition 8. Apparently it's possible to overreach, even in California. Naturally, we've only endured Round One of that circus, as the Governator has suggested the state Supreme Court will invalidate the action. That's an interesting legal theory: Declaring a Constitutional amendment un-constitutional. Perhaps the squat, broad Austrian needs to brush up on the concept of the Constitutional amendment process. On the plus side, I haven't heard much talk lately of amending the U.S. Constitution to allow someone not born here to serve as president. So, thanks for that, Arnold.

At any rate, I can hardly wait to take advantage of this newfound love and respect the world will show the U.S. Lower tariffs, respect for national borders, real assistance combating terrorism and rogue regimes, an end to the proliferation of dual-use technology to execrable tyrants in North Korea, Iran, Syria, and Venezuela, and the introduction of sanity and accountability to a United Nations sorely lacking both. And that's just what I expect to see by the end of January! Yes, according to ABC/CBS/NBC/MSNBC (Not technically one network) a new era has dawned.