post election....

A month since the election, and Washington State still really doesn't have a governor. Well, we do, but with only 42 more votes than the runner up (with ~2.8 million votes cast, after the first and mandatory machine recount), the hand recount is now proceeding and should be completed before Christmas. Of course, if this re-recount changes the results, will we have another one?

I wish we could recount the national election. But, all conspiracy theories aside, the results are what we have to live with for the next four years. It's not that I think the country cannot survive the administration. It will. In my lifetime we survived Viet Nam, Nixon and Watergate, Reagan's trickle down economics and 14% interest rates, Clinton's lying and affairs, and 9/11. We'll survive the loss of US prestige in the world, and we'll survive the war(s) we've become embroiled in. We'll even, eventually, get by the fact that besides going to war in Iraq for false reasons, in doing so we've created even more potential terrorists with a deep and all encompassing hatred of our country, and who only want to kill Americans and to damage our country physically and economically.

What's really been bothering me though, is that while the country will survive, so many in our armed services will not. How long can even the half of the country that supports our involvement in Iraq continue to do so without a clear reason? Will we end up slowly backing out, an exit strategy that we make up as we go? Will this end up being our next mini Viet Nam?