I’ve stayed away from writing anything about politics for a long time.  There’s actually been a lot I haven’t addressed, mostly cause I haven’t addressed much of anything, especially recently.  But tonight I think I will change that.  Maybe it will inspire me to write about the immigration bill, a month too late, or the Arcade Fire record, several months too late.  Oh well.

I’d never been very interested in primary elections before, mostly due to my age and what we’ve seen in the years since I’ve been a legal voter.  In the run-up to the 2000 election, there was a decent primary.  The Gore nomination seemed a pretty obvious end, and, though I liked McCain a lot, there was no way he was going to take Texas, the state I voted in in that election.  So that primary was pretty much a bust.  When the general election came, I voted for Nader.  Right.  But again, I voted in Texas, so any vote was a wasted vote.  I felt then, and still feel today, that we’d be better off with more, effective parties, so I was really casting my vote for an idea, less a candidate.  Plus I was 18 and went to college in Boston.  Some things can’t be inoculated against.

Last election, I was still voting in Texas, so it was still a lost vote.  Plus, I felt that there was a pretty strong horse-in-midstream mindset around the country, so I was shocked the election was even sorta close.  Shows what sort of dude we’re dealing with.  So finally we have a primary season really worth considering, with a really open field on both sides.  Nothing is foretold, so spending hours a day pondering this election is almost, almost, sorta, kinda worth it.  This primary matters, and this election matters a ton.

So I’ve been thinking.  Generally I’m pretty moderate, politically, so no party was immediately shut out.  But, really, the Republicans are shut out.  Why?  First of all, the whole batch is only about 1/8 of an intellectual inch from believing in a flat earth.  With the exception of McCain, they’re all for the gay marriage amendment, and McCain only backs out because he thinks it should be left up to the states.  (That said, I believe he’s against it and just pretending its a federalism issue.  I can’t imagine McCain really cares one way or the other.)  They’re all pretty much for Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, though I imagine some of them would like a tougher test.  They’re all pretty much wrong about immigration I think, thinking along the lines of “Immigrants knocked down the WTC!  Build a moat!”.  Again, McCain is being a lot more pragmatic about this.  Also, he’s the only non-nutball that doesn’t actually have to vote on this.  Yeah, Brownback and Tancredo are nutballs.  Really, so why not McCain?  He’s pretty conservative, but I don’t think he really cares for a lot of issues Republicans make a lot of noise about, so I don’t think any of those things would really be affected by his presidency.  But he’s unelectable, unless the Dems elect Kucinich.  Right.  Not only unelectable, but he’s lost a lot of credibility across the spectrum.  I still would have loved a McCain in 2000, but add 8 years of kowtowing to Bush, he’s kinda lame.  There is one way I’d vote for him.  More on that later.

I would like to mention that Romney and Giuliani suck terribly.  I don’t think I need to mention why.  But they do.  Both of them equally, and extraordinarily.

So this has been a super long post, but I haven’t even addressed the Dems, nor the subject, so I’ve got to go on.  Basically, Bill Richardson would be awesome, but he’s weird looking, so he’s out.  That’s unfortunate, but really, he’s got such a tremendous resume, he should just go make a zillion dollars in the private sector.  Kucinich is crazy, as is Gravel.  Related note… Why do they even let gravel on the debates?  At least we know Kucinich will add some super liberal wackery, but Gravel is just boring.   So let’s to the top three.  John Edwards strikes me as the Democrat Mitt Romney.  Awful.  Super polished, but super anti-septic.  Plus…  I don’t know.  He just looks like he needs to be punched.  I’m not threatening him, I’m just saying he looks like he’s asking for one.  I don’t understand why anyone likes him.

Next comes Clinton.  Again, she just sorta sucks.  She’s like Edwards, in that she’s retardedly polished and seems fake.  Like when she jokes about praying to lose weight.  It was so awkward and contrived, like, “Look, I’m a woman!  I worry about my body weight!  I’m totally relatable!!!”…  Yes, you’re totally like Cathy.  I also am amazed that she could run and win a spot in the Senate from New York.  No Texan would ever vote for someone who hadn’t spent at least 20 years there.  If I think about it though, I’m glad.  If she ran from her home state, I’d have a serious problem.

So really, when I think back on this list, the problem isn’t really any positions, it’s just credibility.  I don’t feel like any of them have any.  The closest is McCain, but he’s been losing it.  So really that leaves me with Obama.  It’s not really a process of elimination, it really started with, “What does Obama has that for some reason makes him so attractive as a candidate?”  And the more I thought about it, it came down to that.  His positions aren’t that radically different from the others, but he just seems more sincere and straightforward.  So I like that.

In the next days I’ll really get into some policy stuff, but honestly, the credibility is the most important thing.  It’s what we’ve been lacking for the last 7 years, and it’s what we need.