Election night

So I ended up voting Obama/Biden. Partially, it was a gut thing; I thought about how disappointing it'd be the next day if McCain were president. But my rationale justification was that the Republican party is where the Democratic party was 4-6 years ago: in its death-throes. No central ideas or solid plans, no sense of real direction, just maintain the status quo. And like the Dems over the past year, the only real opposition is driven by anger and zealotry, not rationality or proof. And Obama has shown that, in practice, he's more pragmatic than ideological (and hopefully Rubin and Volcker can convince him that "fairness" has limited use in economic policy). So I'm okay with seeing what the Democratic party does; just gotta hope don't they screw up like the last two times they were in power (fortunately, a lot of their seats are up for grabs in 2012).

One thought is that even as America goes Democrat, EU has already begun going more to the right (I'm thinking Sarkozy or Merkel, to a lesser extent, Brown). Politics on continents have shifted due to economic pressure. Since a European conservative is essentially a moderate American liberal, it seems like we're nearing a Western political consensus.

Last night itself was pretty insane in Brooklyn. People started gathering on the major street corner, encouraged by car honking. In fact, the chorus of cheers elicited could be graded by the size of the honking vehicle. Small sedan, big SUV, van, bus, and finally GARBAGE TRUCK each drew progressively larger crowds. So, basically, imagine a rally of grown 2-year old boys. Eventually people figured out, hey, they can dance in the MIDDLE of the street, which was slightly more exciting than dancing on that boring sidewalk. So a bunch of nerdy white professionals started dancing in the street, while the police just sort of laughed and thanked the higher power that they were assigned to a neighborhood that they singlehandedly kick the shit out of. I tried to capture some video on camera phone, but it didn't really do the scene justice, so here's something from the Columbia Blue and White website. It was taken up on Broadway and 115th.



Basically, same idea as Park Slope, except slightly younger white nerds.