William Reardon’s Blog

I’m voting for George W. Bush tomorrow.

This may all be moot since I think Kerry will win, but I’m a little surprised. Though a registered Republican and avowed conservative I’m surprised because when it comes down to it, I don’t really want to.

I don’t really want to vote for him because while I don’t believe that Bush lied about the WMDs, I do believe he should held accountable for their absence. I don’t really want to because while I don’t consider Iraq a miserable failure, I do think it could be going better. I don’t really want to because while I do admire some of his characteristics, he’s not the type of leader I want to follow.

Democrats, why didn’t you give me someone I could vote for?

This probably will have been the easiest election ever for you to have gotten my vote. My impression is that there are a lot of other conservatives in a similar position. It wouldn’t have taken much. There was no delusion that the Left would throw out the whole of their platform, but hell, a moderate Democrat, articulate & direct, a clear vision with a solid plan for Iraq would have been all I needed.

But who did you give me? Kerry.

Not that I mind the DNC powers that be sabotaging Dean’s campaign & his lead. From a Republican viewpoint, that guy was almost as good as Nader.

Not that I have a problem with Kerry because of the Swift Boats. I live in California. Not a lot of point in running their ads here. (I actually question how much impact ads like Swift Boat or MoveOn ads have at all, but I digress.)

Not that I think Kerry is a “flip-flopper.” Okay, well, he is. But so is just about every politician, including Bush. It’s part of being a politician: when you’re not kissing babies you’re taking their lollipops.

At the same time, Kerry has done a miserable job communicating his vision on Iraq. Vague general hand-waving has been done, but nothing to make me go “ah-ha!” Yes, Kerry says there where mistakes made. With that, you have my attention. But you have to keep going after that. You can’t tell me there where mistakes and stop. Tell me what you think the mistakes where. What you would have done differently. How you will do things differently. As a testament to how confusing he has been on Iraq, I’ve yet to have two Kerry supporters give me the same answers when asked about Kerry’s views on the war.

In his defense, I can understand why he may intentionally ambiguous about it, and quite possibly, it may be very well what ends up winning him the election. But it’s not going to get my vote.

Nor is Kerry particularly compelling as leader. The most positive thing most of his supporters I know have been able to muster is “Well, he’s better than Bush.” Which, to them, pretty much anyone had out of the gate. In setting the bar so low — “Anyone but Bush!” — that’s exactly who they got.

And just anyone isn’t good enough for me to flip-flop.

Number 1
“Then, what happened was that he was impressed by the monarchies and the military regimes [of the Middle East], and he was jealous of them staying in power for tens of years, embezzling the public money without any accountability. And he moved the tyranny and suppression of freedom to his own country, and they called it the Patriot Act, under the disguise of fighting terrorism. And [George H. W.] Bush, the father, found it good to install his children as governors and leaders.”

Number 2
“[George W.] Bush and his administration were aware of what was going on. And we never knew that the commander-in-chief of the American armed forces would leave 50,000 of his people in the two towers to face those events by themselves when they were in the most urgent need of their leader.

He was more interested in listening to the child’s story about the goat rather than worry about what was happening to the towers.”

Tonight should have been Bush’s home-court advantage, the focus being
Iraq, Terrorism, and so on. He seems to have squandered it. Some of
it isn’t too surprising. Despite what Gore
may think, Bush’s strength isn’t oration. Kerry did an excellent job,
especially going after Bush on Iraq without appearing overly negative.
Bush failed to capitialize on any of Kerry’s missteps or bring out any
strong cases for himself in the general area.

Personally, I was disappointed at the lack of substance. Not
surprised, but still disappointed. Kerry said multiple times he had a
plan, but I failed to understand what it was. Even after reading his
website,
I’m not sure how it differs from anything we’re doing right now. Part of what feeds into why my vote will probably stay with Bush.

The coming days should reveal the impact of the debate. Interesting
days on http://www.electoral-vote.com/
for sure. Up until the Republican Convention I was pretty sure Bush
was going to lose, but he came out of it with a fair bit of momentum.
Wonder if Kerry will be able to swing it his way after tonight.

Tim Russert had an interesting point the other night about why some Americans may favor George Bush. When Bush speaks it’s generally in clear, simple terms: I was right about the war in Iraq then & I’m right about the war now. I think this about Terrorism… whereas Kerry will tend to be more like “I’ve studied these issues for 22 years…”

As mentioned in the news, it looks like Bush has gotten a bump off the RNC, which also seems to be reflected on the very cool www.electoral-vote.com.

Visit with Mom & one of my brother Chris is going well. On Friday, spent the day mostly in Pasadea area, visiting the Huntington Gardens & driving the Angels Crest Highway towards Mt. Wilson.

The Huntington was cool for me as well, for despite having been a member for two years, I never actually visited the library until yesterday. Even knowing they had a Guttenburg, it was still awesome to get see it, along with editions of the Bible pre-dating the printing press and hand-copied by monks. While behind a glass case, the manuscripts where held open allowing one to see a couple of pages. It’s one thing to have read about the ornamentation enscribed on each page, quite another to actually see them.

I would have been sufficently impressed with the Bible collection alone would have been amazing, but a few rows over first editions of the Leviathan, works by Locke, Common Sense, and so on… This place is a U of C’ers wet dream come true. I tried reading what I could through the glass, but next time I’m showing up with my dog-eared Penguin Classics versions to see how closely the line-up.

Oh yeah, the family trip.

Today was West LA, driving through Mulholland drive (as recommended by Sang), stopping for lunch at the Saddle Ranch on Sunset, then onto Venice Beach and Santa Monica’s 3rd Street Promenade. Tomorrow is a small BBQ & a chance for my mom to get to meet some of LA friends. Chris leaves Monday out of LAX, so following dropping him off, I’ll probably take my mom to see more of the nice houses in Beverly Hills & maybe stop off at the Grove. Tuesday’s still TBD, possibly a tour of Warner Brothers.

Interesting point brought up by Dick Morris on post-convention coverage tonight: While Bush supportors are pretty much in agreement on Iraq & the War on Terror, Kerry voters find themselves very split. The stats he cited:

Should we stay in iraq?

• Bush voters: 71 yes/23 no
  
• Kerry voters: 37 yes/54 no

Is the war in Iraq an integral piece of the War on Terror or a Distraction?

• Bush voters: 79 integral/14 distraction
  
• Kerry voters: 36 integral/50 distraction

Are we winning the War on Terror?

• Bush voters: 77 yes/10 no
  
• Kerry voters: 33 yes/42 no

So, as the debates progress, and we find out more about Kerry’s views, it’ll be interesting to see what happens. If he goes right and strengths his position favoring the war on Iraq, will he lose lose some of his base to Nader? If he goes left, will he lose some to Bush?

Another reason this election year is going to be an interesting one.