Anybody else penciling in this time?
 

Anybody else here unhappy with any of the choices enough to pencil in this time?

The stakes are too high. I voted 3rd party last time (not that it really matters in DC), and we got the worst result ever. Kerry's not great, but he has to win.

Kerry is awful. Bush is worse. I may change my mind but I've got to vote for something not against something.

That's how I felt four years ago. I guess I was fundamentally optimistic when it came to politics, and I felt that even if Bush won, he couldn't be that bad, because the two parties were two sides of the same coin.

George W. Bush and Tom DeLay destroyed that illusion for me. They, along with the Republican leadership in the last four years, have been systematically destroying all social progress made since World War II. They consider politics to be more important than governance, and will do anything to increase their political power - and their rank and file will not call their leadership on it.

I am not a rank partisan. I would probably have voted McCain over Gore. If the Republican machine had not grown so powerful and poisonous, I would consider voting McCain over Kerry if such an event occurred. But now the Republican party has been coopted by the religious right and the PNAC. The people compromised by those groups need to be removed from positions of leadership, or this country will go to a dark, dark place.

I've read speculation of McCain crossing over to be Kerry's running mate, that would be a strange dynamic. I don't know how many Republican votes McCain could pull from Bush. If they play the fiscal responsibility card, they could do some damage IMHO.

The choice, for me, boils down to not voting or pencilling in. I'm not even sure how many people know that that is an option.

Until there is a candidate that I feel is worthy, I'll pencil in. Not voting is tacit approval of whoever wins, and I don't approve.