Why can't I get excited about this election?
I'm a dKos old-timer (UID: 8093). I signed on here during the Dean campaign. I was IN to that election...I couldn't leave it alone. I'd get into shouting matches with friends and relatives over the merits of Kerry over Bush. No dinner party went by without some spittle-flecked invective flying out of my mouth directed at one of the guests. I read every blog, newspaper and magazine for election news. I wanted to know every detail of what each candidate said and did. I fumed over every insane rant from Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh, plotted in my imagination all the wonderful, horrible ways someone could off Karl Rove and his ilk. I posted regular diaries on dKos. My husband was so irritated with me and my obsession I swear he was inches away from leaving.
Then Kerry lost and something deflated in me. On the one hand I could see nothing good coming from 4 more years of George Bush. On the other hand, the stinking pile of putrid scum that is today's Republican Party served to us nightly on a shit platter might well be just the wake-up call this country needed. The Republican's have not let me down on that count.
Yet I find myself this past 3 years running on sensory overload. My outrage meter spun so furiously for so long it burned out at about the time of the Scooter Libby trial. I followed the whole debacle but felt curiously detached when Bush commuted Libby's sentence. I mean why get outraged at the logical outcome?
Rumor is that the invective flying on this site is getting out of control....the my-candidate-is-better-than-your-candidate diaries take up most of the server space these days. Gotta tell ya....I wouldn't know. I quit reading candidate diaries a long time ago. I read the occasional GBCW diaries and wonder why the writer cares so much about what other people have to say. I am just beyond giving a shit.
I can't figure it out. Am I alone with this? Are the candidate wars mostly a product of the newcomers? Are there other dKos old-timers suffering from electioneering burnout?
In the end, of course I"ll vote. I liked Edwards, will likely vote Obama in the primary and will vote for any Democrat in the general. I WILL NOT sit this election out because my favorite candidate didn't win. None of us should be that stupid.
What say you?