[That Guy]

Originally Posted by JWsleep

The thing that most disappoints me about recent US politics is how very polarized everything is. And for that I blame Rove more than anyone. 9/11 should have been like Pearle Harbor; it should have brought the nation together. Instead, it was used to brand the opponents of Bush policy as anti-American. And it got wrapped up with the religious stuff as well. All to build Rove's "permanent" republican majority. That went well.

Meanwhile, it drove the far left off a cliff--conspiracies, embracing anything that's against Bush, no matter how crazy or potentially harmful. They kind of fulfilled Rove's plan.

Then this election came, and I felt pretty good: I liked both Hillary and McCain, and Obama seemed fine, though I didn't know much about him. I figured, hey, no matter who wins, we get something better this time. Than McCain embraced the Rove operatives, picked Palin, and it just spiraled back down hill. Is this really the campaign McCain wanted to run? How did he let it get to this nonsense? Palliing with terrorists? Unamerican folks in congress? It's just milking all those same divisive things and worse. Obama had the balls (unlike Kerry) to answer in kind, but it's a friggin mess.

Hope Obama can really pull in some moderate repubs and serious people to be in his administration. That would help a lot, I think. Chuck Hegel at DOD, Powell anywhere he wants to be, Warren Buffett, whoever. Just bring the country together! We've got some serious issues here.

(Steps off of soap box...)

leave gates, put powell and buffet anywhere, and we'd be SOO much better off. seriously, those are real heavy weights that actually know what they're doing. powell gives him military respect and an advisor to counter his weakness there, and buffet basically ensures no one can call that a weakness - as long as he's willing to listen to their advise.