After all, it's Constitutional and, as has been pointed out previously, places the military firmly under civilian control. What I cannot abide is the "Unitary Executive", as concept that is the antithesis of Constitutional government, the goals of the American Revolution, and our heritage of liberty. Any President of the United States who pushes for "unitary powers" has betrayed and violated his oath of office and deserves summary impeachment, and if guilty, removal from office. I would not stand in the way of a tar-and-feathering mob, either.

Cindy Sheehan, who a Salon writer once credited with having almost single-handedly started the anti-Iraq war movement, is battling for the Congressional seat of Nancy Pelosi, the first female Speaker of the House, all this in Salon's home city of San Francisco. This epic campaign of a genuine American hero pitted against a bulwark of Washington insider politics has been deemed unworthy of attention by Salon's editors. A person who has given the last few years of her life in an unremitting struggle to bringing peace and justice into the world is running against the politician who has greased the skids allowing the Bush/Cheney program of violence, torture, and crime to move forward.

Salon joins other establishment-based media in taking no notice, effectively endorsing the incumbent, who, like Mr. Bush, will not debate Ms. Sheehan, falling back to the argument of inadequate time. This is the grossest insult to San Francisco voters and to the country at large.

Will President Obama pardon Bush, Cheney, and the rest of the criminal clique, will he just ignore them, or will he begin the process of investigation, arraignment, trial, and conviction?

Than to disturb the tranquility of my home with a phone call. Actually, the only political phone call I've answered in this campaign season is the now infamous California Republican Congressional candidate Zane Starkewolf's sexy-voice robocall. I'm voting for him anyway, just to keep the Democratic incumbent on his toes, but the call didn't help him any.

As a former Democrat, I wrote to the Obama campaign early on, specifying what he would have to do to earn my vote, specifically disavowing warrantless wiretapping, foreign military adventures, torture, and deficit spending, none of which he has done. The result of this email message has been a deluge of "political spam" in my email, increasing my resistance to voting for him. I'm currently undecided, but only among Nader, McKinney, Barr, and Baldwin.

We've already had one president who bore the numerical identity of the Anti-Christ in his name: Ronald Wilson Reagan. Count the letters.

And they have every right to be disillusioned with the Republican leadership, who came into office with the promise of reducing the size of government and respecting the Constitutional rights of citizens. Of course, George W. Bush, with his multitude of signing statement, his expansion of intrusive surveillance, his willingness to let deficit spending explode, etc., all does not play well with these believers in small, responsible, frugal government that exists primarily to preserve their liberty. They may think that Obama can rein-in some of the more flagrant abuses perpetrated by the Bush Administration.

The Electoral College system of electing our Chief Executive perverts and undermines our claim to being a democratic nation. I live in a state that polls heavily for Obama, so neither candidate is going to spend any time here, as one has its electoral votes sewed up and the other doesn't have a prayer of winning them. This concentrates the campaigns in the so-called "battleground" states, whose voters enjoy a vastly disproportionate power and responsibility for selecting the best candidate. This is hardly consistent with the concept of assigning equal responsibility and power to all citizens.

The Electoral College was originated at a time when the Founders envisioned this country as a collection of states vying for power and influence within the Union. The question of whether a state may secede if it considered its participation to be disadvantageous to its interest was unresolved. The late Eighteenth Century Americans experienced a sparsely populated country that would literally take weeks to traverse. Stronger identity with the state seemed reasonable. However, since the inventions of the railroad and the telegraph have shifted the attitudes of the people to seeing themselves as citizens of a truly United States first and of specific state only secondarily.

Well, I'm taking advantage of Senator Obama's overwhelming popularity here to vote for a third party candidate, secure in the knowledge that nothing I am doing is going to shift the election to Senator McCain. My vote is only worthwhile as a protest against the stranglehold the two principal parties have on the American political process. If I lived in West Virginia or Indiana it would be otherwise.

If so, he will ask the Justice Department to investigate the run-up to the Iraq invasion to determine if the blatant lies told by Bush, Cheney, and Rice are in violation of federal law. As I understand it, the deliberate and calculated use of misinformation to provoke military action is a felony. Indictment, trial, and punishment must follow. And to hell with "state security", which has been a much abused excuse for covering up crimes by the Executive Branch during the Bush years. Nothing compromises our "state security" as much as allowing treason by our most powerful leaders to occur unchallenged.