Well, almost a week since the great election of ’04 and the world still hasn’t exploded, either from bomb blasts or massive riots — color me surprised. Of course this is just the lull before the storm. Come Inauguration Day, the second running of the elephants under G.W. Bush will begin en mass, and the battles will begin again. Still, that doesn’t mean there hasn’t been foreshadowing and bickering already on the public stage.
Talk of spending “political capital” has been heard from Bush while many debate wether 51% equals a mandate or not. My opinion: he got a mandate on morals, but his claim is quite lacking when it comes to domestic issues and the war on Iraq. Unfortunately, I see their tunnel vision already developing: a mandate is a mandate, and we’re going on a tear like there’s no tomorrow.
Of course, no mater how you slice the pie the Bush contingent won this race and I’m even willing to concede that it was done fair and square, though there is a vocal minority that claim we’ve been had again. Still, there was a far greater amount of purple on the plains than I thought there would be from just looking at those damn electoral maps, especially when the county size was on the smaller size (i.e. a greater population density). While it might have been a Republican win, I find it hard to see any mandate. The president will still push his agenda, just as i expected Kerry to do if he won. Nothing different on that front. But if there was a mandate in place I’d expect there to be little in the way of a struggle of getting that agenda through. Can anyone honestly say that will be the case here?
In the end, the only true solution to all this might be a redrawing of the district lines. Where are all my New Americans at? ^_^
Tags: Politics