Given my increasingly jaundiced view of the democratic process as it exists in this age of ubiquitous media feeding the incessant cupidity of the superficial for the fools gold of trite bemusement and instant gratification - given that shouldn't I be a supporter of Obama since his socialist designs are essentially undemocratic and seek to overthrow the American system of 'negative rights' and replace it with the wise counsel of an enlightened aristocracy made viable by the obsequious support of a majority granting underclass that is ever dependent on it?

Well, no. I'm being overtaken by a cancerous cynicism not a consumptive stupidity. Still, does raise an interesting question: what exactly do I believe? How would I defend democracy if I was going to defend it? If I think it's vital, absolutely necessary that Romney, for all his flaws, defeat Obama, can I legitimately do so if I no longer believe or can maintain a serviceable faith in democracy? Or is it I just haven't figured out yet how to defend democracy given all the bad stuff that is happening but still have the sense that those 'negative rights' need to be defended because the alternatives to such are all roads to where Hayek said they went?

I dunno. Think it's the latter.

The 'functional' electorate is divided between partisans of each side who are aware of the issues but whose opinions thereof are vitiated by the taint of bias - these partisans may be paying attention but they view all through distorting glass. There indeed are moderates in each camp of a more reasonable and objective bent who are susceptible to breaking off and adhering to the other if properly motivated, but one suspects that the more ideologically rancorous a campaign becomes the more likely these moderates 'keep the faith' and stay close to home - this no doubt why Obama all along has been running such a negative race based on class warfare rhetoric, character assassination, racist innuendo etc etc. One would hope that moderate democrats would be inclined to shake off their chains and wander given the state of the economy and the sad state of the country in general, but polling suggests these potential 'free elements' can be held in place by blaming Bush - and accordingly Obama's stock response by way of explanation viz current trouble is to blame Bush - witness too Clinton's tour de force of Bush blaming at the convention.

The 'dysfunctional' part of the electorate [these assignations obviously quite relative given that under the cold light of reason the entire electorate is essentially dysfunctional and to a jaundiced cynic like me probably beyond all hope of salvation] belongs to the independents - unlike partisans, these intrepid souls cling to their ignorance of the issues, either because of a native dislike of politics or more likely simply out of laziness or indifference. On the plus side, this lassitude tends to leave them free of ideological prejudices - of course it also leaves them quite vulnerable to simplistic messaging and impulsive rationalizations. The keen insight of this esteemed group decides elections.

Which brings us to the fourth estate and the media in general - if independents decide elections and at the same time are highly vulnerable to easy manipulation - and we add to that the reality that increasingly our perceptions are controlled by simplistic, exploitative media and this media has an undeniable liberal bias and in the case of Obama a bias so visceral that one smells the rank rot of a desperate and utter corruption - well, isn't that a rather toxic and fragile delineation? Are we not straddling the abyss here? Does this election fascinate because the dynamics of it might finally throw into sharp focus just how close we are to a dangerous upheaval or a despairing decline?

[this why I tended to believe that should Obama end up winning when by all rights he should be toast, in the final analysis probably the only person who had a chance to beat him was Christie - the big guy couldn't have reversed media bias of course, but given how appealing a character he is and how that would have made it hard for the media to contain him or falsely pin him to a narrative, these qualities would have stood him in good stead and well positioned to effectively counter-act Obama worship, to level the playing field as it were. Ryan helps Romney in this regard, and should he convincingly destroy Biden in the debate that will help a great deal - but only if Romney also does well in the debates. With the help of media bias painting Reagan as a dangerous, dimwitted right wing extremist, the wholly undeserving Carter was leading well into October of 1980 - but then the debates revealed a Reagan at odds with the media portrait of him and the rest is history. Romney will likely have to pull off the same kind of reveal - unfortunately, Romney is no Reagan - on the bright side, 'undecideds' tend to break against an incumbent, and if one believes recent analysis that suggests the polls are not capturing the true disposition of things, ie Romney is actually ahead, then carrying the bulk of the undecideds should be enough to show Obama the door regardless of the media's fervent desire to not let their cherished liberal dreaminess crash and burn]

[cause when you think about it the uber left and their media cohorts absolutely need Obama to win in order to save themselves, to preserve that dreamy prism through which they view the world and their place in it - Obama's a manifestation of every naively idealistic bit of nonsense they believe in, without a second term in which to rewrite the history which at this point will label him a Carter-like disaster of a president, what becomes of them? Even they may not be able to summon up the vast amount of denial and dissembling that will be required to drown out this reality - although, if anyone can do it it's these people]

[fair to say though that likewise I need him to lose in order to preserve my narrative - right now everything has played out the way I predicted in 2006 viz Dear Leader, so given that odds may incline one to think that a second term couldn't possibly be as bad as the first, there's a risk there to me - still, I'm pretty confident in my judgement that Dear Leader is an absolutely awful fit for CEO of America - he should be out giving pretty speeches to the hopelessly deluded, that's what he's good at, that's where he belongs]

Oh, dear... the world is spinning out of control... and the editorial board of the New York Times assured me that electing the black guy who gave pretty speeches would fix all this... can't even trust the givers of light anymore... all is darkness.

Well. I remember that sycophantic, whinging uber liberal EJ Dionne announcing - no, proclaiming with enthused pride the day after Gaddafi was dispatched that Dear Leader had just won through the economical brilliance of leading from behind a far greater victory than Bush ever did or could with his marauding, imperialist armies.

And how people like me laughed with such sad bitterness at the astounding naivety of such sentiments. Yet still the fools preen and laud their grand illusion. I click on Politico's website this morning and what's their headline? The GOP's foreign policy muddle. These people are redefining what it means to be a pathetic toady on a daily basis.

And now Obama has asked Google to pull the offending video? Really? That's what it's come to? The Chief Executive of The United States of America blowing the first amendment out of the water in order to censor some amateurish piece of shit video on YouTube in a vain attempt to placate the ever unplacatable fucking Muslims? Wow. Worst-President-Ever.

"But what’s strange is that so many people don’t find it strange at all — that at a critical moment in the affairs of the republic the ruling party should assemble to listen to a complacent 31-year-old child of privilege peddling the lazy cobwebbed assumptions of myopic narcissism."

This from Mark Steyn's latest on Sandra Fluke - not necessarily one of his best pieces but makes a good point about something that bugs me constantly - the myopic nature of so much that passes for political debate in this country - the way that so much of the discussion seems rooted in the vague neediness of some personal, emotionally contextualized response to issues rather than the dictates of logic and reasonable, coherent, objective insight. Listen to Obama's supporters - it's as if they've completely detached themselves from reality, as if they inhabit a dreamland where they're sustained on a steady diet of shallow cliches, empty rhetoric and airy hypotheticals. A world full of Flukes - held aloft on the flatulent reek of a vain and vapid idealism.

This myopia is on full display with liberal advocacy of gay marriage - we're talking about an issue that at most probably impacts about two percent of the population, and that may be wildly over stating it - and yet liberals go on about it as if no greater crisis threatened the country - and of course that's because this advocacy for them is like wearing a big, bright badge of honor that announces to all and sundry "look at what a wonderful and enlightened person I am - I support gay marriage! Yea for me!". It's pathetic. Now, I oppose gay marriage, mainly because I consider it an affront to common sense and logic to pretend there's not a wide existential gap separating the categorical imperatives of fecundity underlying all heterosexual love from the generative 'neutrality' of the rut that dare not speak its name - but the more practical side of me is inclined to say "sure, go ahead - why on earth a gay person would want to get married is beyond me - but whatever, let's just get it over with cause the country has bigger problems than the love interests of a handful of gays and we should really be TALKING ABOUT STUFF THAT ACTUALLY MATTERS!".

I suppose, for iran, the best way to pay back Israel for an attack would possibly not be to rain [or attempt to rain] down missiles on the country but rather to cause general upheaval throughout the region as a consequence so as to stoke anger against Israel, not only in the region, but globally - in essence Iran would play the victim to Israel's cruel, self centered aggressor so that when oil prices spiked and the already fragile global economy crashed countries already predisposed to hate Israel would, well, hate it even more. This scheme would involve shutting down the Strait of Hormuz and possibly attacking other gulf states or finding some other way to draw them into the hostilities - not to mention how Assad might try to use the chaos as cover for a major escalation against his problems.

So would such a plan by Iran be much more likely to deter Israel than a 'mere' retaliation from Hamas etc etc? Possibly. Lot of unknowns here.

[and the biggest unknown is that of Netanyahu's confidence in the trustworthiness of Obama to do the right thing viz Israel's security needs. To me this is the dynamic people tend to overlook when talking about the likelihood of an Israeli strike on Iran - of course there are strong reasons, of both a strategic and practical nature, why Israel should forbear, especially if acting alone - but if you're the decider in Israel and you've come to the conclusion that, one, a nuked up Iran is not an acceptable outcome, and two, Obama cannot be trusted, then you're between the rock and the hard place and green lighting an attack becomes very real - and when Bibi speaks what I hear is a man who has looked through the door and seen the devil - he doesn't trust Obama, and for good reason as far as I'm concerned]

I see that ol' Vlad, grand inquisitor of riotous pussy, has now come out and endorsed Obama's reelection. First Middle Kingdom's sagacious oligarchs make known their preference for The Chosen One, and now the pure as driven mud magi of a Russian oligarchic renewal speaks up for the same sanguineous hope of a continuing American decline. These are glorious days, my friends.

And yet Obama still might win - hell, likely will win if he can cozen enough blacks and Hispanics into fervid belief that if elected Romney plans to enslave them all and eat their children. It's all so depressing. To a sane, rational, clear thinking person it should be obvious there's only one choice to be made here and that a failure to see the obviousness of this would mean one was either grossly ignorant or suffering under the delusions of an ideologically induced dementia - and yet it appears half the country at least is either shockingly stupid or quite simply out of its mind. Very depressing. So depressing I had almost decided not to write about this nonsense anymore - politics too often now is like listening to an argument between two idiots about who deserves the title of dumbest - but I couldn't ignore ol' Vlad, he's just such an amusing fella.