ROAD JOURNAL: Politics Is For Suckers

I don't want to write about politics.  And then I feel the urge to.  There is something in writing where you wonder, "How do writers convince themselves that what they write is worth reading?"  I feel sad every time I post, that what I write isn't good, and if it is, that it will be misunderstood; then I shrug it off, and go on, because, hey, it's written now -- where for it, if not here?
At the moment I write this I am in Rhode Island.  In a Best Western.  I drove nine hours today.  Tired.  And there's five or six things I want to rid myself of, and force onto you -- thereby I can forget about it.  There's my apology.
Last night's debate, the final debate of the season, was curious.  I found myself feeling bad for the President.  He looks tired.  He has the incumbent weight of responsibility in his eyes.  I don't think he has been a bad president.  I didn't think Bush Sr. was a bad president either.  I'm not sure I'm capable of thinking of any president as bad; it is too easy for me to see their failures on a Shakespearean scale, and credit them for attempting an impossible job -- that is: promising just and radical alterations.  It's akin to promising a Super Bowl victory in four years even though the team you're taking over went 2-14.  But to get the job, you must promise a ring.  Here's the president last night, (and to borrow the worn out boxing cliche'), throwing some pretty tired haymakers: inherited shit economy, little girls in Israel, bin laden, car companies; the man's not bullshitting, but it doesn't matter.  I think barring something big, this might be over.  It could come down to who can steal and/or suppress the most votes in Ohio.  It's how it goes.  Aggregating all major polling information, if you compare today to this same day in 2004, (the last incumbent presidential election), and mind you this is the mean number of all national polling data:
the spread is Obama -0.9.  He's down 48.0 to 47.1.  Tight, tight, tight.  But down.
In 04 Bush was at +2.7 at 48.5
The other problem is that on September 23rd of '04 compared to '12, the incumbents were:
Obama: was 48.3 and +3.7
Bush: was 48.6 and +5.2
-- That's no buffer.  It's precipitous.
And hate all you want, Mitt Romney is no John Kerry.  The president's campaign spent 400 million dollars this summer trying to convince the country that is exactly what Mitt Romney is: an out of touch rich dope.
-- Take your personal feelings out of this, and the accuracy of what has been claimed in the three debates, Mitt Romney has rope-a-doped the President.  He stunned him in debate one.  He jabbed through debate two.  And all of a sudden we're in the last debate, and someone finally told Obama that he needs to throw heavy because Romney's moving numbers, thus the haymakers, but now Romney's laying on the ropes like Ali while Foreman punches himself out.  Romney didn't go out to try to attack Obama on Libya, he doesn't think he needs to; he's where he wants to be, doing a Ronald Reagan impression while Barack tries to get his groove back via hack jokes.  Fascinating.  Romney's either two weeks away from being John Kerry, or his debate strategy will be studied in political science courses for how quickly he turned this thing.
-- I don't believe Romney.  But I didn't believe in hope and change either.  I do believe the media today is so wrapped up with bayonets and binders that they missed the real shot last night.  Romney twisted the discussion to China, to trade, clearly his wheel house -- my ears perked up when I heard trade war and US Patents.  I know, not as catchy as magic underpants, (and trust me, I know Romney's not looking for me; he's looking for about six million women.. which, by the by, it looks like Obama's lead in female voters is down from a 12 point lead to 5), but for one moment I thought he was about to do something special -- he cut it short.  Too bad for him.  This dead heat may be the end of his rise, (his path through the electoral college is more difficult to overcome), but I thought he was about to make something happen: socialized state-sponsored medicine, where relatively successful in other countries, is supported by the fact that these countries ignore US patent law, copy billion dollar medication developed by Big Pharm -- it's a parasitic relationship; I'm not knocking these countries for doing it, just that it's not so easy for this country to do it.  If we could knock down these other countries from basically Burger Kinging our invention, (i.e. waiting for McDonalds to do all the research, development, and construction, then move in across the street), maybe Americans could get a better deal on meds.  But we can't afford to not have the meds, right?  It's the same with Chinese manufacture.
-- As written here at The Daily Beast by Peter Beinart, the winner of the foreign policy debate last night is W, because neither candidate talked enough about economic foreign policy, but military foreign policy, and both still under the definitions of a particular cowboy.
-- But here's the other one.  What exactly is wrong with corporate tax breaks?  Had a discussion the other day with another one of these friends of mine that thinks I'm right of Genghis Khan, and this person, extremely socially liberal, could not believe that when she went to Home Depot to purchase tools, found all major brands are made in China.  That's right, something as downright hillbilly American as Craftsman, uses Chinamen slave labor.  Sad stuff, right?  I bit: Would you support a realistic candidate, (rather than idealistic), who would incentivise Craftsmen to stop paying the Chinese 7 cents an hour making deep socket 3/4 inch ratchets, and start paying Americans 15 dollars an hour to make them, thus instantly returning good manufacturing jobs back home, via some tax breaks?  You can call it "profit".  But how else can you get Craftsmen to come back here?  Tax them?  Really?  Real accounting works otherwise.  I'd give obscene tax breaks to any company that manufactures here and only here.  What would ten million jobs do for you?
--   There.  I'm done.  Too tired and about to go off the rails.  I'm voting for Ross Perot.  Just kidding, I'm not voting.