World events at the speed of a snail!!!

Things are happening so quickly it's hard to keep track of. Where did I leave off... ?

Oh yes. Kerry concedes, Bush recognizes the "mandate" given to him by 51% of the country which listened to their churches or were genuinely frightened to vote for Kerry. Keep in mind that terror attacks could come at any place at any time, so everybody in small town rural America better damn vote for Bush. It worked. Jesus, is Karl Rove a happy man lately.

Arafat is dead, and suddenly Bush is interested in peace in the Middle East. Wait, peace? I thought we were setting up democracies? I'm so confused... I mean, if peace was the goal, why would we knock down the region's most stable regime? Sure, Saddam was awful, but 1) he never attacked America and doubtless never would have and 2) why are we not playing soldier in countries with far worse human rights violations, like Saudi Arabia, Sudan, or China? So now Bush gets to play peacemaker, and given the circumstances it might even work, and our warmonger president may end up being known throughout history as a peacemaker. WHAT IRONY IS THIS?

Ashcroft resigns, Bush taps Alberto Gonzales. Is it pandering to the Hispanic vote? Pandering to the minority vote in general? Bush simply picking an old buddy of his (who probably got his first job with Bush 10 years ago in an effort to pander?) Is it attempting to replace Ashcroft with a Hispanic Ashcroft, one more immune to outside attacks to stay within the realm of political correction? If you watch the news, and I sure hope you do (and not Fox News, that doesn't count!,) then you doubtless have heard the comments Gonzales has made about the Geneva Conventions. The words used, if you haven't heard, were "obsolete" and "quaint." Okaaaayyy...

Could it be possible to have an Attorney General worse than Ashcroft? Doubful. I think Gonzales will be far better for the civil liberties folks of this country. That doesn't entirely comfort me, though...

In other news, the Fed bumped up interest rates. They are still below the neutral rate, ie the rate at which it makes no difference. What does this mean? Saving your money with interest doesn't even keep you above inflation. How much sense does that make? Absolutely none. It's still a great time to invest your money in silver, although there may be a considerable downward movement in silver in the near future. If it hits $6.50 again, then buy buy buy. It may still drop more short term, but long term you'll see significant gains, especially if the Fed continues printing money and toying with inflation as recklessly as they have lately.

I know it's been forever since the last update and I'm going to try to keep posting more often. I'm just considerably angry about the status of things.

How could this happen?

At this point, I'm going to assume that Bush is going to win. I could be wrong, but I'm going with that assumption.

So how could this happen? How could a guy with Bush's record - which is absolutely awful - get reelected? His approval is below 50%. Most people disagree with him on a large number of issues. This election should have been a CAKEWALK for the Democrats...

...but they've basically lost the House. They've lost the Senate. They've lost the Presidency. (Note: this blog contains forward looking statements. hehehe...) How?!?

The Democrats gave up on what they are good at. They gave up on gays, minorities, the environment. They gave up on Howard Dean. They gave up on the interesting, motivating, and controversial elements in their party. They went into an election where a majority of Americans thought that we should have a new president with a candidate they chose solely because they felt he could beat Bush one on one... and lost.

What's the answer? Is it what I eluded to above? Have the Democrats abandoned their former base?

At this point, I'm too tired to come up with a real answer. I'm too tired to come up with a theory. I'm just pissed - but not surprised - that all of these states are banning gay marriage. I'm pissed that nobody has even mentioned Michael Badnarik, despite the fact that his numbers are right in line with Ralph Nader's (trailing 325k vs 292k at this point) and he's on more state ballots.

Anyway, the Republicans are back in control in a big way. God help us. More later.