'TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE HISTORY

Excited? I sure am. I've really got a night-before-Christmas feeling this evening.

As you may have already read here at Real Art, I'm planning on voting for Ralph Nader tomorrow especially because it appears this state, Louisiana, is safe for McCain, not much chance that "the Bradley effect" will play any significant role here--Nader represents my own vision for America much better than the mainstream competition, so he gets my vote.

But that doesn't mean I can't be happy about Tuesday's probable outcome. For starters, the fact that Obama is an African-American bears undeniable symbolic significance in an enormous way: electing a black man to America's highest office will not end racism, no, but it is a big "fuck you" to what is perhaps the most shameful and horrific aspect of this nation's history and social/cultural/political/economic structure. Associated with this significance is the big "fuck you" to the relatively few unrepentant racists left in this country, and the much larger group of self-denialists harboring racist attitudes which they do not recognize as racist.

I'm also really looking forward to the kick I'm going to get out of the simple fact that diehard asshole conservatives will have to watch from the sidelines as the center-right Democrats they despise as "liberals" run the country. These right-wing deadenders believe that only they can rule America legitimately, and will attack as viciously as they did during the Clinton years, but their howls of indignation now have all the credibility of the boy who cried WMD, so they'll just look stupid, which will be very entertaining.

Beyond all that, I greatly anticipate Obama's rolling back the Bush II era to the more moderate, although still conservative, era of Bush I/Clinton. Not the degree of change we need, but still significant.

But then, maybe we will ultimately see the change we need after all. Here's my hope: Obama's coattails allow the Democrats to do as they wish in both houses of Congress, which, when combined with the pissed off mood of the nation during this philosophical moment exposing Conservative Movement principles as false, and also combined with fierce agitation from the true American left taken for granted by Obama after the primary season, will force our new "liberal" president to actually govern as a liberal. That is, FDR was no radical, but circumstances forced him much further to the left than he ever would have imagined before he was in the White House. I'm hoping for a repeat here. We may be facing a new liberal era in the United States if we're lucky.

Unless the Republicans steal it again, which is very possible, considering that it's now appearing more and more likely that they did it in Ohio during the '04 election. If that happens, who wants to join me in a nationwide general strike?

Go vote!

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