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He conceded.

I wouldn't have. Make them count 'em all and then wait.

But I am not a nice person. Civilised, gentle even, but pig-headed, stubborn, angry and not in any mood to grant anything to these people.

Which isn't why I'm writing. I am busy, and so have not had time to look at anything other than old responses to things I wrote last week. I am sure the parts of the blogosphere I inhabit will have much gnashing of teeth and rending of hair.

So be it. We lost. I say that even if there was chicanery, and the election was stolen.

I am scared, saddened and incoherent (inconsolable may follow, but not for a year or two) at the moment.

I was afraid of this... because we lost, and we lost weeks ago. At a party recently a friend asked how the election could be so close. The answer is terrifying, for all the reasons I've been pointing at.

This election wasn't decided on it's merits. By any objective measure, Bush is a failure.

That means objective measures weren't used. Gut-checks were how people voted. It was a demagogic referendum and the forces of intellect lost. History has shown this in the past, the results have seldom been less than catastrophic.

I think (and I am going to ramble here, I'd write something shorter, but I've not the time) bin Laden got what he wanted from the Spanish bombing.

I think Cheney was right, if Kerry were elected we'd be more likely to see attacks.

Who was the target of attention for the Spanish bombing (I'm at a class on terrorism, it's focused some of my thinking, and you will all be the recipients of that focus, try to restrain your glee)?

It wasn't the Spanish, they were going to turn the bastards out.

I think it was us. I think Al Qaeda wants Bush in office, and knew he would point to the bombing as proof that those who stood against terror would be terrorised.

And I think if Al Qaeda wanted Bush out, they'd have bombed us, gassed us, shot us, in general proved Bush can't protect us. But they didn't. In fact they let plots be uncovered, before they could be implemented. That let Bush say he was winning (or at least containing) the war on Al Qaeda.

And that let people vote on things which tugged at the irrational aspects of their intellect. Who can marry whom. Who protested the actions we took in our last doomed war. Who is going to cut taxes (not how, but who). And crap like that.

Not the question of how we are running our police, our gov't, our economy today... but rather what fantasy vision of how it ought to be. Ownership society and suchlike tripe.

I'm rambling.

I have a crystal clear idea of what I see looming in the future, and I can't think of a way to explain it.

The demagogues will continue... There are not enough Jon Stewarts. The lack of thought will appreciate (Franco had a teaching, "Education/intelligence + Military Fervor/Patriotism = K [a constant]) and the lack of real value to the elections will grow.

I am afraid that this political movement is the greatest threat to the Republic since the Civil War. We have a cancer, eating up our brain, and we are feeding it.