That’s a bumper sticker idea from Charlie Miller, MoveOn Precinct Leader and my meetup friend, commenting on how we can continue to go foward in my earlier post.

After all is said and done, I believe important foundations have been laid. Whether it be how Meetup and organizations like MoveOn have empowered folks to get involved, or the tremendous turnout, you need to admit that the energy and enthusiasm you saw was an awesome thing. It means that a growing number of people care about activism and politics again. I’m already looking forward to new ways to get involved.

Things were so hopeful. I went door to door in three wards yesterday in our get out the vote and I gotta tell ya, my legs are killing me. I had the option of going to three different election related parties, but choose a quiet night at home with Richelle, with some popcorn and some wine, to take in the results. The early exit polls reported were very positive, but then our appetites disappeared as the states fell one by one. Voters were saying a candidate?s morals and values weighted more importantly than the economy or the war on terror. We stayed up until 3:30 AM, our stomachs twisting and depression mounting.

Pennsylvania did its job. Philadelphia did its job. I feel proud of the reality-based community here. We came out in force and the efforts of MoveOn, ACT, and PA Victory, and so many other groups were impressive. I’m very happy to have been a part of that and to have met so many great folks. I feel very bad for Joe Hoeffel, Tim Kearney, and Ross Schriftman; all three were very deserving of the posts they were pursing, but at least Allyson Schwartz won. I’m looking forward to her serving us in Congress.

So what happened everyplace else? Well Bush and Kerry both reached out to their bases, and the Republican base has more reliable voters than the Democratic one. That?s the bottom line. This enabled Rove to craft a strategy that played just a few notes and played them well. The strategy allowed it to focus and ignore the rest of the country.

There will be those that say the Democrats lost because they didn?t communicate with their base well enough, for example, by nominating Dean, and if they did, they would have won. I don?t think so. The problem is the Democratic base isn?t as simplistic as the Republican one. It?s the big tent. It takes more to reach these folks, to let them know that their votes matter, that they have a candidate that has a chance to succeed. So many are disenfranchised don?t vote in the first place. In short ? they need a Bill Clinton.

Let’s get this clear: many, many more did vote this year. They voted in record numbers, and without them, it would have been a landslide in the G.O.P.’s favor. You have to take heart and know it is something to build on. Saddly, in proportion, Republicans are statistically more likely to vote, and that trend continues with this election. Trends like that can change. Importantly, candidates like Bill Clinton have shown a way to reach across the divide and encourage votes that might not normally happen.

I really like John Kerry. I like his story, I like what he’s done, I like his take on the issues, I like the way he thinks and I like his vision for the future. I felt he would be a great President who would work hard to fix the damage that’s been wrought these past four years. But it’s clear: the country is divided. But it’s not by political party. Don’t fall for that. It is divided by how it decides who to trust.

Did the Internet play a role in this campaign? Yes it did. It provided the tools for Democrats to get close, but in the end it all comes down to election day and turn out. No matter how good your operations are ? if the voters don?t come the polls, you?re not going to win.

Speaking of the polls, there 1754 election related incidents in Ohio and 26,990 incidents reported across America so far. This isn?t over yet. (Update: it is over, Kerry has conceded, even with all these election day incidents unresolved).

The stories and questions of this election:
1. Internet empowered community and campaigning works, but it all comes down to how many vote.
2. Morals, faith, and social issues matter (NYTimes). Get it through your head. You can?t win unless you recognize that a large portion of the country votes based on how they feel about a candidate instead of what they know. This is frustrating, and makes me want to run to Canada.
3. Simplicity in message and candidate matters (Slate). People trust things (people, messages, damn near anything) that seem simple. By and large, more people trusted Bush than Kerry. That’s despite the reality-based reasons they should have felt otherwise.
4. You can extrapolate this and ask yourself, what will become of the right to choose for women, and will gays and lesbians ever share the same spousal rights as the rest of us? Will the government’s increasing encroachment into our private lives grow? Will stem cell research atleast occur off shore? The Supreme Court is going to be changed for a generation and the Republicans still control all three legislative branches of government.
5. Where did the center go?
6. What role did the new voting machines (especially Diebold) play? Will we ever know the real winner?
7. How come the big discrepancy in exit polls vs. actual votes?
8. How did this election compare, numerically, to 2000? Did anything actually change? Bush won the popular vote. Think about it.
9. Bush was elected (yeah I know, shut up will ya) in 2000 without a mandate. He then pursued a radical agenda that divided this country. Will he look at the results and think he is justified to further his ideological aims (NYTimes) even more aggressively?
10. The results appear to be: 57 million to Kerry, 60 million to Bush, and 100 million to “Whatever”. “Whatever” wins again! With minimal campaign effort to boot (bogarted from a Metafilter thread but what the hell).

I am very proud of the those I worked with and look forward to continuing the friendships so many of us have started along the way.

Halliburton is having a good day on the stock market I hear. Oh well.

This morning I helped with what is simply called “visibility”: standing on a street corner (not saying which right now) with a honk for Kerry sign along with a bunch of other fine folks 🙂 And it was loud! Very loud. Rocking. A few Bush supporters attempted to join us, with their own signs, but it just wasn’t working out for them. I felt so sad for them.

Afterwards my team went canvassing in one of my old neighborhoods. We covered a huge stretch and I gotta tell ya – the turnout is going to be kicking.

Get out there and vote. That’s where I’m going right now, and then it’s back to work volunteering!

Click to see an uplifting message from John Kerry and the choice we will make tomorrow (today).

If you need help finding your polling place, and are local, remember to use Hallwatch’s polling place locator.

See you later today (or tonight) folks.

Vote!

A little music, with perfect pics, to illustrate an asshole. Yeah.

Goodnight folks. I’m getting up early to volunteer in the get out the vote effort.

If you’ve been following my site closely, or know me in any way personally, then you know that I am not, as Jon Stewart likes to call it, a ‘partisan hack’. Like him, I feel that those that repeat party talking points, like they are the Gospel, do real damage to our country.

I’m a person that believes in small government and one that is as unobtrusive as possible. I believe a strong defense can be a deterrent to those who would attack us. I am a fan of Ronald Reagan, this being against what so many tell me, and probably due to me being young when he was in office, but there it is. I look up to those in our military and honor the sacrifice and them and their families. I go to Church more than just a few times a year. I pray. I read the Bible on and off. And like Reagan, I believe that there is something special about America and its place in the world.

So how can I be so enthusiastic about John Kerry, or to take this even further, to encourage you to vote straight Democratic party this election?

I’m the dreaded social liberal, fiscal conservative. While I believe in small government, I believe that investing in people, providing them tools so that they have an equal chance to fulfill their American dream, is the only way to insure the future health of the country. I mentioned I pray. I’m a Catholic. The social justice believing kind. Bush talked a fair game with ‘compassionate conservatism’, but they were just words. I’ve seen no compassion for the working family from the Bush administration, or for the poor. John Kerry spoke to me in the third debate when he quoted the Bible, ?What does it mean, my brother, to say you have faith if there are no deeds? Faith without works is dead.?. What I?ve seen the Bush administration do is to pander to undeserving corporations with huge contracts and to blame those who have lost their jobs due to outsourcing on their education, when countless of them are already college educated. All the while growing the size of government more so than almost any President in history. Conservatives believe in small, unobtrusive government. Bush is no a conservative. He?s made our government more invasive into our private lives and private decisions. You don?t hear from Newt Gingrich these days as much do you? He offers this President faint support and I?m sure this is the reason why. It looks like Bush?s team has hijacked the meaning of the word ?conservative? and replaced it something new, ?Win At Any Costs?. ?Win At Any Costs? means denying reality and twisting the facts to meet your ideology. ?Win At Any Costs? enables you to shut down debate and to encourage fear. ?Win At Any Costs? enables you to not just see the world in black and white, but in just white alone. There is no other side. To recognize the other side would be to be empathetic, which is counter to ?Win At Any Costs?.

Clinton helped restore fiscal sanity to Washington, and by all accounts Kerry will do the same. It?s about accountability and John Kerry has shown that he?s willing to take on that burden.

As I said, I believe in a strong defense, and John Kerry has provided us with a roadmap that at least stands a chance. It deals with reality. It doesn?t deny the true threat of radical Islamicism. In fact, it faces it. Not simply head on as the Bush administration, but from all sides. We?re fighting a movement. To defeat a movement takes more than simple broad strokes. It takes finesse. It takes rooting it out at its source. Think about it: 9/11 was almost three years ago and Bin Laden is still telling us what his demands are. The bastard is still alive. Do you feel any safer than last year? The year before? Why do you think that is? The assult weapons ban expiring make you feel safer? Our soldiers fighting in Iraq when Bin Laden is elsewhere? How we’ve handled the nuclear threat of Iran and North Korea?

To swich gears a little, let me mention that my health care costs have gone thru the roof these past two years. Completely swallowed my tax break. My insurance is covering far less and I am paying far more of the cost for routine office visits and care. I can?t imagine what the costs have been for families with children, but they must be terrible. Bush is only addressing part of the issue, but the problem is more complex then he is willing to deal with. Kerry?s plans are far from perfect, but they are in the right direction and will help insure millions of others who currently are without even the coverage I have.

I’m going to urge you to vote straight Democratic ticket this year. The reason is simple: all three legislative houses are under the control of one party. Only by restoring balance in the halls of power will we have a government that is forced to listen to its people.

The gang playing to ?Win At Any Costs? needs to lose. We have a choice. And we’re going to do it tomorrow.

Never Forget: Internet Vets for Truth is the perfect example to show how easy it is to distribute video, to a huge audience, on a shoestring budget. Bittorrent empowers folks to publish large files quickly and easily, where once it would have required costly infrastructure. The distribution of the Jon Stewart Crossfire confrontation video illustrates just how far things have come. I believe this election has encouraged folks to push broadcasting?s boundaries, to make up for what the media has not provided, just as 9/11 encouraged bloggers to do the same for publishing.

(RSS + Bittorrent) * Video/Audio Content = the true new media. It’s disruptive technology. Check out TvTorrents for an eye opening peek.

George W. Bush diverted our forces and their efforts from the bastard who attacked us to go after someone who didn’t. Read this Washington Post story for the sad details.

Speaking of taking our eye off the ball, do you know that Iran tested a strategic missle? With North Korea’s help? Or that North Korea recently threatened to turn Japan into a ‘nuclear sea of fire’?

Want to know why? For one, Bush said he wasn’t concerned with Bin Laden (Yahoo!), and just look at all the reasons given for attacking Iraq:

From Foreign Policy magazine. Now that’s a lot of double talk if you ask me.

…researchers compared the mortality rate among civilians in Iraq during the 14.6 months prior to the March 2003 invasion with the 17.8 month period following the invasion. The sample group reported 46 deaths prior to the March 2003 and 142 deaths following the invasion. The results were calculated twice, both with and without information from the city of Falluja. The researchers felt the excessive violence from combat in Falluja could skew the overall mortality rates. Excluding information from Falluja, they estimate that 100,000 more Iraqis died than would have been expected had the invasion not occurred. Eighty-four percent of the deaths were reported to be caused by the actions of Coalition forces and 95 percent of those deaths were due to air strikes and artillery.

eurekalert.org : 10/28/2004