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February 18, 2000
Politics confuse me.
My thoughts are entirely too scattered today. I'm worried and unhappy. Some people I love very much are going through a very bad time right now - I don't really want to talk about it here, because I don't want to invade their privacy. But it's making me sad and concerned. I live three and a half hours away from them, and have no car, so I can't be there. I don't like feeling helpless - although if I were there, I'd likely just be underfoot.
We're also about to be pounced on by a very large, mean ice storm. It's supposed to start around lunchtime, and get really bad in the late afternoon. I wouldn't mind, except I have to work until 7 tonight, and I'm worried about getting home. The T buses have only stopped running once in the 3+ years that I've been relying on them, and that was for a major blizzard that dumped more than a foot of snow on us overnight. This storm promises 6-8 inches of snow, with about three inches of ice on top. Yikes. Maybe MIT will close early...ha!
The paper was chock-full of depressing news this morning, so I gave up reading it. Even the comics were dull. I did find this, and I honestly don't know what to think of it. The article makes this guy seem very noble -- he "wanted out," so he climbed a mountain and let himself freeze to death. Noble? How is that noble? I initially thought that maybe he had some terminal disease and wanted to go out with some measure of glory. But he was healthy, had a family -- he'd had some tragedy, and it seems he had some emotional problems. (Hmm, you think??) So it struck me as being less noble than selfish. what do you think?
I like Joanne. She quoted me. How cool is that? She also made me think about how stupid I am when it comes to politics. I've never been one to have much faith in the American political system. I've been making the effort to get out and vote, even though it usually boils down to voting for the lesser of two evils. I've never really been fond of any of the candidates. And to be honest, I've never really understood the whole system. I took an America Politics and Government class in school, but it was taught by a politician, not a professor. We got a lot of lectures on his pet causes, none of which were very interesting. He was also a very low-level politician, and I think he wished his career had gone farther, so he was very bitter. I came away from the class more confused than when I started.
I don't really get the whole primary/caucus system. Why do only certain states have them? It doesn't seem very democratic, really -- those states get fawned over by the candidates, and the rest get token visits? If anyone can explain it to me, I'd appreciate it. My husband's British, and he is constantly amazed and disgusted by how messed up our government is. (He also understands it much better than I do -- British schools are just a whole hell of a lot better than American schools, it seems.) I'll vote again this year, but I'm sure I'll leave the polls feeling pretty much the way I do every year -- that it really doesn't make much difference either way.
Posted by Mary Ellen at February 18, 2000 10:07 AM