I love this strip.

For example, I hope Clinton and Obama are lying about renegotiating NAFTA. I also hope McCain is lying about liking Scalia type judges and the religious right.

Of course, it is depressing hoping that people are just pandering instead of sincerely changing their views to positions I think are stupid.

Thanks.

I had the widest sensation and emotion that I'll never ever forget, ever, ever, ever.

Reading:

The sentence, "And I don't mean to actually insult four-year-olds in the audience."

Tom Tomorrow draws:

The bashful turning away from eye contact.... I laughed aloud, and then I experienced simultaneously, a shooting pain pierce through my sore leg...

Yeow wow!

I have just returned from watching a 'Curious George" monkey DVD.

I had buttered popcorn and Reese Candy pieces with a four-year-old.

Yeow wow!

A sharp nerve-ending pain sensation... It was the "weirdest" Yeow wow! I'll never forget.

I agree totally. I'm sick and tired of talk about reaching across the aisle.

I want a candidate who takes a principled stand on the issues and then fights for it regardless of what the repugnicans want.

'president' should be replaced with 'head clerk.'

'commander in chief' should be replaced by 'referendum clerk'.

and finally, the american people should declare themselves the masters of the nation, not some politician with a big smile and deep pockets.

in short: the flaw is the absence of democracy.

Electing a president isn't analogous to hiring a summer intern. Nor is it tantamount to choosing a religion. Neither nit picking over "job qualifications" nor worshipful adoration are appropriate.

Why do we need an analogy anyway? Choosing national leaders in a democracy is precisely that — choosing national leaders. It should be a datum of civic life, not something for which we have to struggle and reach and grasp at metaphors in order to make sense of the process.

I think the reason that the Hillaryites and the Obamamaniacs are acting this way is because they have seen it work so successfully for the other side. Just talk to any Republican about Reagan and you will see adulation that will make your brain melt. It was transferred to GWB and even after trillions of dollars wasted and a string of unmitigated disasters some of them still get teary-eyed and hearts all a pitter-patter at the mere mention of their dear leader.

After immigrating here to America, my father, a surgeon for 20 years, had to take the State Boards (from scratch) to obtain a medical license, as the U.S. doesn’t recognize foreign licenses. Fascinated by Freud’s writings, findings, and theories he decided to switch his specialty to psychiatry. One day while watching a program on TV that was showing the Nixon/Humphrey campaign, he turned to me and said, “isn’t it something; the very qualities it takes to “become” President are the very qualities you don’t want to have “in” a President.

If you run through the Presidents we’ve elected since then, (it didn’t sink into my head at that time) his comment proved to be quite prescient.

Now that I have recovered enough to type once more I must give praise..

That was one of the funniest lines I have heard in ummmm.. a long time..

If you are part of a society that votes, then do so. There may be no candidates and no measures you want to vote for...but there are certain to be ones you want to vote against. In case of doubt, vote against. By this rule you will rarely go wrong. If this is too blind for your taste, consult some well-meaning fool (there is always one around) and ask his advice. Then vote the other way. This enables you to be a good citizen (if such is your wish) without spending the enormous amount of time on it that truly intelligent exercise of franchise requires. -RAH

"Choosing national leaders in a democracy is precisely that — choosing national leaders."

We don't choose "leaders"!!!

We elect/hire the nobly entitled, "public servants" - something that was once a hallowed and admirable (and impermanent!) calling.

See: Washington, Jefferson, et al.

Christ!!!

New Yorkers elected the shiny new 2006 Eliot Spitzer by a very large margin. He was imminently qualified, at least on paper, for the job. Nobody knew about the shady things he was eventually found to be doing then; all we knew was that he has a long record of cleaning up New York as Attorney General. If any of this stuff was in evidence back then, you can bet the New York Republicans would have pointed it out - again and again and again and again until we were tired of hearing it. Of course, we're used to hearing this stuff from the Republicans by now, and we're also used to at least 90 percent of it being pure bullshit, so it's difficult to distinguish Republican bullshit from the truth. Nevertheless, one ought to be careful not to blame New Yorkers for Gov. Spitzer's shortcomings; it wasn't our fault because we simply did not know.

On the one hand I guess it's comforting to rattle and rail that they're all crooks and liars. On the other, the purists leave all the interesting decisions to everyone else to make. And then they complain about being excluded.

Anyone who thinks their candidate has no flaws isn't paying attention, but you need one that people will rally around. I think it is unrealistic to expect elections to be a fully, or even mostly rational process.

But I agree with his "maybe especially then" comment. E.g., I never understood how someone older than four could rattle on about "Blame America first" liberals. Obviously, you hold your own side to a higher standard, because you expect the most from them--otherwise why would you choose sides in the first place? This was obvious to me until some point in early adulthood it dawned on me that large segments of the population had it backwards and really held their own side to lower standards. In fact, maybe this is the norm of human bonding and I've been fighting my own instincts. If so, we're all probably lucky to have made it this far.