the most hateful presidential election ever, or the mother of all mud-slingin'?

History tells us that mud-slinging is nothing new in politics. In fact it was politics that invented the term, and the rules. Rules? Where we're going, we don't need rules... And so we have arrived at this date in history (check the date on the blog...) and all of the smear the fear tactics employed impressively well by Team Bush. As Americans know all too well, this life under the shadow of fear began on the 11th of September, 2001. Ever since then, the message from El Casa Blanco has been two-pronged: Keep doing what you've been doing, especially as regards spending and consuming petroleum products; and be always vigilant, in other words live life the way you want but never forget to look over your shoulder. This has become especially true of the latest craze amongst desperate housewives; the role of security mom. I won't go into this exciting new look (you have to click on "security mom" in the left-hand pane) because I have already discussed it before (see below...) What absolutely amazes me is that so many people have not caught on; it has been three years since that terrible day, and granted, we have not had any attacks on our soil, thank God, but how much of that fact can be attributed to Bush et. al. doing an outstanding job on home security and how much of that to the fact that it takes time, preparation, money and people capable of pulling off another event like 9/11? I mean, let's face it folks, as GWB likes to say, "Fool me once...", and if we were to have another event similar to that, then someone could say that we deserved it. And yet, the notion that terrorists exist and are lurking at our borders, mustachioed, chisel-toothed grins flashing in the night like so many Mack knives, is the prime motivator of the leviathan that is the Team Bush engine.

It is this fear, and its daily perpetuation that has been keeping Bushie just a nose ahead of Kerry, if you believe the polls... As I have stated before, Team Bush seems to be taking not just a page, but the entire book of Nazi propaganda and using it to not only prevent US from ever relaxing, but keeping us hyper-aware of the newest Fear; this is our Cold War. And like the torture tactics created by the CIA, this form of sleep-deprivation, call it comfort-, or perhaps, more sinister yet, freedom-deprivation is turning a large part of this country into foaming-at-the-mouth conservatives, ignoring the basic tenets of the Republican Party, our Constitution, and the Bible as they post increasingly vehement blogs attacking anyone or anything considered to be Democrat, which by way of this twisted extention equals liberal, equals atheist, equals communist, equals sexual deviant. This seething anger at an unseen, unknown and understood enemy who could attack at any time, anywhere and apparently, could be anyone, including one of our own(!) has, in absence of any actual threat or person, been turned onto the opposing party as the embodiment of all that is un-American, therefore anti-American, and then therefore the enemy.

As Team Bush repeatedly have been telling US recently, a vote for Dem is a vote for Them. This, seems to me a markedly different stance taken by TB immediately after it was apparent that Kerry would be their opponent in the 2004 race. If you remember, during that brief period, TB was casting Kerry as a dour, negative person who did not have a personality let alone a positive plan for US. Since then Kerry has been able to shape his platform more definitively and has taken over the reigns of a positive message while TB has retreated into their secret bunkers, shouting slogans and repeating the mantra of fear and terror over and over.

That this is one of the most polarized social periods in US history is reflected in our candidates and perhaps one of the most acrimonious runoffs for Prez in recent history. As I said at the start, history has taught us this, and there have been things far worse said and done by politicians towards one another in order to win a political seat, but not since WWII have the consequences of the President's decisions weighed so much like the sword of Damocles, poised to cut US off from the rest of the world indefinitely. I have not completely agreed with Kerry on all points, but I certainly do not agree with Bush on any point, so my choice is clear; 4 more years of increased polarization and tension in my own country while outside, we are more and more seen as a country to be feared and distrusted. History has taught us another thing; this is not what our founding fathers envisioned, at all.

"All propaganda has to be popular and has to adapt its spiritual level to the perception of the least intelligent of those towards whom it intends to direct itself."
-Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf ("My Struggle"), Vol. I