Mostly Good News for the CDU

I'm rather pleased to see the Christian Democrat Union (CDU), with Angela Merkle at the helm, has come out ahead in Germany. I am disappointed that she was not able to get the 40% that would have been necessary to allow the “preferred” coalition that has been talked about over the past few weeks, but even if she must work with Schroeder's Social Democrats, it will at least force the left to accept some of CDU's ideas. Perhaps this bodes well for the CDU's pro-life platform plank?

Real ID Act

“He also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead, so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name.”

— Revelation 13:16-17 (NIV)

Ok, so I'm not going to say the newly approved Federal Real ID system will be the mark of the beast. But that is not going to make me like the idea of a federally run ID system in the United States. I don't like the idea of carrying around a smart card that I must present to open a bank account or get on an airplane. How much information do I want the government to have?

I just happened to run across an Flash advert from the ACLU today (see here). It is well done and somewhat amusing. But it also demonstrates the frightening possibilities of a nationally connected ID database. Sure, I don't think the local Pizza Hut is going to start worrying about my health soon, but a little hyperbole hardly invalidates the point of the ad. Yes, let the record show that I agree with the ACLU on this.

Interesting… there are many signs of the apocalypse occurring at the moment. First, there was the case a week or two ago when I found myself agreeing with Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League, now I find myself agreeing with the ACLU. What's next? Four horsemen doing a cross country tour?

Voting

Municipal elections are always disappointing; it never seems like there is enough to vote on to make it worth one's while to come in. Take today: there was some construction at the church where my precinct is, so I had to walk a ways to the entrance, then wait while they looked up my record and so on. It probably took five minutes from the car until I received my ballot. I then went to the Vote-o-Matic and was pushing my ballot into the ballot box less than one minute later. sigh

At least I got one of those nice “I Voted” stickers out of the deal.

A Statement on the State (of the Union)

I'm not feeling energetic enough to give Dubya a full review this year, but I'll just say he did an excellent job. Every year he gets better at presenting the State of the Union. I just wish I could have been there.

Our president laid out a confident, clear plan of what needs to happen in Iraq before we leave, the need to modernize social security, the need to vote on judges in the Senate and much more. Of course, he also threw in another nod toward lowering dependence on foreign oil, a push for the Marriage Protection (Constitutional) Amendment and acknowledgment of the need to protect life at every stage.

There was not anything surprising but it was good. It was much more of a nuts-and-bolts domestic issue kind of speech rather than the philosophical champion of freedom style of speech that we had two weeks ago at the Inauguration. That's not to say that Iraq did not get significant attention (or that there weren't some not so veiled threats went out to Syria and Iran), but that international issues were not the main focus of the speech. I expect the big discussion point in the coming days to be Social Security Privatization rather than the “Axis of Evil” or Iraqi Interim government plans, as the discussion went the last two years.

What did you think?

Ashcroft Resigns

I feel kind of bad about feeling happy that Ashcroft is resigning. I mean, he's a Missourian and I supported him as a senator. By most accounts, the DOJ seems to be running quite well under his command. My main problem with him is the USA PATRIOT Act and, really, only the PATRIOT Act. As discussion flies around about who will replace him, I wonder — will they be any better? In actuality, I can't remember the last AG I did like… so maybe Attorney General Ashcroft wasn't as bad as he's seemed the last few years.

Summary of My Election Night Posts

In case you don't want to look through all eight of my election night posts, here are the high points:

• Most of “my” candidates won, including U.S. Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO 2nd District), whom I forgot to mention in my candidate post (see link) and whom bumps up my total support of the GOP to 9 candidates (vs. 1 Dem, 5 non-partisans and 0 other party candidates). Everyone won that I voted for, save state Rep. Catherine Hanaway (R-Maryland Heights; Speaker of the Missouri House) for the Secretary of States race and Chris Byrd ® for the Attorney General's race. Hanaway, apparently, discovered how hard it is for a St. Louis candidate to win a statewide election, despite Sen. Jim Talent's 2002 win that added “sen.” to his name (he lost the gubernatorial race in 2000 in a very close race).
• TNGALLOP proves an accurate predictor of the winner! Surprise, surprise!

Today's Schedule: Four More Years!

• Sen. Kerry will give a concession speech at 12:00 CST.
• President Bush will give an acceptance speech at 14:00 CST.

This is great news. On the other hand, I do feel sorry for Kerry — I know it must be terribly hard on him, especially since he apparently has aspired to this job for most of his life. I also respect the senator for not dragging this out for days on end or even for the rest of today. Who wants to bet he tries to take Daschle's job now that Daschle has lost his seat in the senate?

Congrats to President Bush: let the celebration begin!

Kerry Calls Bush; Concedes

John Kerry has called President Bush to concede the election according to CBS Radio News, Fox News and CNN. Updates when available.

Looking Good, Will Kerry Concede?

Well, after sleeping for about seven hours, I am back. Right now, Bush is leading by 136,211 votes in Ohio, he's all but taken Iowa and New Mexico as well. He leads with a 3.5 million vote popular vote lead, making Dubya (No. 43) the first president to win a popular vote majority since 1988 and George Herbert Walker Bush (No. 41).

The Kerry campaign looks like it plans to hang in for quite awhile, which seems potentially unreasonable. In 2000, Bush hung in because he was leading in the Electoral College, despite being behind in the electoral college. In 2004, Kerry seems to be behind in both the Electoral College and the popular vote. In essence, if this becomes a “multi-week election,” it will be the second time the Dems have made us suffer that in four years.

Election Night Part VIII

I'm going to go to bed. Right now, Bush is barely leading in Iowa, although Iowa's election workers are apparently tired (!) and the machine for counting broke, so we won't hear what happened there until tomorrow. In Ohio, the lead for Bush has grown to 126,345 votes — that looks really good… let's hope it holds.

It looks like Thune will oust Daschle in North Dakota amazingly. Blunt looks good in Missouri for the governorship. Overall, that is one gain in governors for the GOP and two gains in the Senate.