Me so scared

What I'd really like to do is go to bed, right now, in the middle of the day, and stay in bed, preferably unconscious, until about two weeks from now, when the election will be long gone, the recriminations will be mostly over with, and my anxiety about what the hell is going to happen will be easier to let go of. I used to have respect for the voting process. After all, it's the only time we can express our opinions to those in power and they have to listen to us. Now I know that a highly organized expression of the collective will is no guarantee that the resulting actions of government will be anything to be proud of.

Plus, I am heartily sick of all the political ads. They're showing up in our mailbox and on our answering machine now, there's so many that the TV can't contain them any more. It's hard to know for sure if a candidate has her heart in the right place, but it's a sure bet that the people she hired to do her advertising are reprehensible swine. Advertising people are of questionable character anyway, and having chosen the specialty of political ads does nothing to improve their characters.

So, I expect this election to go one of two ways. It could go fairly well and turn out to be the first swing in the opposite direction from the nasty unpleasant trends of the last several years. Or it could be the final proof that the system is broken, a chaotic rodeo of subverted expectations that demonstrates that representative democracy is a good idea and somebody ought to attempt it some time.

Wake me up in a couple of weeks.