Post-Election Thoughts from Cook's Corner

Posted by Steve Cook on 11.07.2008

Yeah, it took me a few days to recover from Obamamania. What about it?

Even though the polls told me it would happen, I didn't really believe it. I guess I had grown used to supporting the losing side in national elections while everybody around me rejoiced. Being a moderate liberal in Northern Kentucky can be pretty lonely sometimes. I'm usually surrounded by people who think Bush does a good job because he sends them tax rebate checks. As long as they have more money and those pesky gays don't get married, it's all good.

Yes, I know there are a lot of intelligent conservatives out there. I've met some of them, and a few of them I even consider friends. But, these are not the types of people that I typically find myself associating with. The types of people I end up talking to buy into the notion that Barack Obama is a dirty socialist that's going to take all of their money and give it away. They believe that Obama will magically end elections so he can be President forever. They're very easily persuaded by morons on talk radio that yell about the coming of the apocalypse every four years but forget who's really in charge. I don't know if they noticed or not, but for six out of the last eight years Republicans had control of the executive, legislative & judicial branches. This didn't stop them from complaining when something went wrong and blaming Democrats for it even when they didn't really have power to do anything. And once the Looney Left got control of the legislative branch, suddenly they were the ones driving things into the ground. I guess they've never heard of checks and balances, which I remember first hearing about in fourth grade. Don't worry guys, you've still got the Surpreme Court, and something tells me that Thomas & Scalia aren't going anywhere. When the world ends, all that will be left are cocaroaches, Cher, Thomas & Scalia. You heard it here first.

And on a side note, how come all I ever hear about is the media being biased towards liberals when the conservatives have their own news network and have talk radio on lockdown? Maybe it's just different for me because I work in Cincinnati, where most of the citizens think it's 1988, not 2008. Coincindentally, 1988 was the last time the Cincinnati Bengals made the Super Bowl. Maybe they want to leave the memories alone? I'm just saying, I hear a lot more right-wingers on TV & radio than left-wingers. Am I the only one? The libs do have the Internet sewn up pretty well, as many of our commenters will tell you.

Listen, I'm not going to tell you the left has all the answers. I can't say I'm a huge Nancy Pelosi fan, guys like Jesse Jackson & Al Sharpton give me the willies, and frankly I like the idea of a smaller, more effective government. Unfortunately, the Republicans don't seem to believe in that anymore. I guess I wouldn't mind all of their new and exciting government spending if it was going somewhere other than a war so far has been more trouble than it's worth. (But, it does sound like things are turning around, and I hope they continue to do so.)

Ashish has made a brilliant point in some recent commentaries that sum up why I haven't joined most of the rest of my family in the Republican Party. They've closed their doors to so many different types of people in order to pander to their kind of people. From a political standpoint, this makes no sense, and I've always been the kind of person to not care about race and gender and superficial things like that. I also don't care if people are from cities or the country, though I admit that if I had the choice I'd probably go out to the middle of the farmland and set me up a nice farm. But as somebody who was usually picked last on the playground for sporting events and as somebody who's been rejected by more women than I care to remember, I can tell you that being left out sucks. If you're not willing to open up your party to everybody, you're not going to win. Simple as that.

It kinda sucks that I can't share my feelings about the election with most people I know. My family for the most part is in denial, my mom wouldn't even watch the election coverage. I would call my grandparents, but I'm afraid of how they've reacted to a black man being elected President. They had a hard enough time dealing with the fact I had a black roommate in college. My friend the Penguin has been reduced to posting articles in the Politics Forum about how the world is "rejoincing" over Obama's victory. He's not taking it very well. He also didn't take it well when I sent him a text message on Election Night asking if he liked apples. I sympathize with them...I remember four years ago when I was sure that the country would throw Bush out on his keester and how disappointed I was when I realized we would get four more years of him. I eventually found solace in the fact that it would provide plenty of comedic material. I don't think that's really what we should want out of our government, but I was trying to be positive.

I think what I'm getting at is this: if I can put up with eight years of George W. Bush, surely you guys on the right can put up with at least four years of Barack Obama. If it doesn't work out, offer me somebody better than John McCain or Sarah Palin in 2012 and we'll talk. That's the thing with us lefties...we're pretty open-minded.