I started to realize in the last few months that it has less to do with his political beliefs or his views on the various issues.  While his views are solidly in the Democratic party’s side of the field, I have increasingly been realizing that I feel like that’s more of a intersection of values than it is loyalty to any particular party.

All this has been very intangible for me until I read the Week in Review in the newspaper this past Sunday morning.  Week in Review is always my favorite part of the news paper, and not just because it’s the only part of the papers with comics; I appreciate the summary of the events.  (I read it for the articles, not the pictures.)  This week’s edition had a great summary of the candidates and the issues.  It was when reading Obama’s summary that I finally realized why I have so much failth in his guidance:

Everyone contributes; silent lurkers will be interrogated. (He wants to “suck the room of every idea,” said Valerie Jarrett, a close adviser.) Mention a theory and Mr. Obama asks how it translates on the ground. He orchestrates debate, playing participants off each other — and then highlights their areas of agreement. He constantly restates others’ contributions in his own invariably more eloquent words. But when the session ends, his view can remain a mystery, and his ultimate call is sometimes a surprise to everyone who was present.

I think that leadership revolves around the guiding a team, as a group, to finding the best possible solution to a problem – not individual team members’ selfish desire to have their solution be chosen.  Some people call this “working for the common good”, but I think that is too abstract.  It is about selflessly finding the best way to approach a problem – which is exactly what Obama is doing in these meetings.  He is mining for all the ideas and information and then using this judgement and leadership to steer the team in the right direction.

It is this leadership that I will be voting for on November 4th – not just his party or his voting record or his policies.  It is knowing that he will be choosing the best solution regardless of where it comes from that makes me sure I am voting for what will surely become one of the greatest presidents of our time; afterall, the last president to show this style of leadership was Abraham Lincoln.  And, when it comes down to it, I am confident that if the best idea comes from the Republican side of the house (unlikely!), he will not hessitate to support it.

Hunting season is a lot like Election Season in the sense that, given Sarah Palin’s special intrests, I feel like putting on an orange jumper any time I turn on the television.

After the 2000 elections, I was devastated but blissfully unaware of how terrible a president could be.  During the 2004 election, I wrote a song called Shadows and Rain as a critique of the Bush Administration.  The song’s message is split between pre-election optimism of our country doing the right thing and post-election disappointment at having failed to do so.

So, do your duty as an American Citizen and vote. And remember: Obama supporters vote November 4th, McCain supporters vote November 5th.

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I notice he’s made a few changes to his candidacy statement.  Let’s review.

First of all, his photo is full-color now.  As a man proposing we leverage our considerable technological skill to colonize space, I’m happy to see he noticed that computers support color images these days.  Well done.

Second, he appears to be concerned with the three-fold increase in human population in the last hundred years.

Instead of starvation, genocide, and war, we should use nicer methods (such as the head tax and birth fees and study and work and social security) to decrease the number of people boarding Spaceship Earth. Goodspaceguy is pro choice on almost everything.

How could you ever disagree with someone who is pro-choice on “head tax”?

Thirdly, diplomacy is important in politics, and this guy’s got it in spades.  Read this passage and think about how much better it sounds than “Get off the couch, you lazy, bottom-feeding Americans!”

Meanwhile on computerized Spaceship Earth, Goodspaceguy wants us to raise the quality-of-life by longevity research and by getting more people working, producing the goods and services that will make up our improving living standard and health. Let’s improve the incentive system. Let’s coax more people into productivity. Goodspaceguy wants safety-net employment of helpers. Goodspaceguy wants more people studying at our colleges during the underutilized evenings and weekends.

Well, Michelle and I are off to vote tonight, and you can sure as hell bet I’m voting for GoodSpaceGuy.  This guy is a “Straight-Shooter” with “Upper Management” written all over him!

Read more from the horses’s mouth at http://colonizeorbitalspace.blogspot.com/

I’m going to try to tell the American people what I believe will make this country great, and hopefully that will be a testament to my patriotism.

Well, it’s human nature to fear what you don’t understand, so it should come as no surprise that this outraged conservatives who don’t understand the concept of having your words and actions mean more than wearing a pin on your lapel while ordering U.S. Troops to their deaths. Scared shitless, they paint Obama as being unpatriotic.

I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but the job Barack is applying for is not really a “good” job; I have a hard time imagining that anyone who runs for President is doing so because they think America is worse than, say, Kazblackistan.

But Obama isn’t the only one catching it from the conservatives. They’re also pissed at Google for commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the Sputnik launch. Apparently, acknowledging actual events is also to be filed under “unpatriotic.” Never mind that Google is a technology company and that they are recognizing one of the most important scientific events of the twentieth century, one which heralded the Space Age and helped usher in an era of incredible technological advancement. No, Google is obviously run by a bunch of commies.

Conservatives argued that Google is unpatriotic because it honored the Sputnik launch, but not Memorial Day or Veterans Day:

It’s a kick to your belly. I understand these guys are scientists and engineers and they have their quirks…but why not celebrate the struggles that we’ve come through as a people?

To begin with, honoring the Sputnik launch celebrates what we’ve come through not just as Americans, but as a global society. Sputnik is a symbol of the Space Race and the Cold War, and Humankind as a group has grown tremendously due to it’s launch. And here’s another thing: Google is a company with an international presence and most of the rest of the world could give a shit about our military holidays, especially when we’re running around invading anyone who displeases us.

Ultimately, Stuart McKenzie summed it up best:

Download audio file (sputnik.mp3)

Through a process of trial and error I have discovered that a key contributing factor to the effectiveness of such a phrase is whether or not it makes sense. This is why I strongly discourage George W. Bush from using this technique.

As I stated before, I am no fan of the early-morning press conference; today was no exception. The silver lining is that there is always something said that makes Michelle and I stop what we’re doing an look at each other in disbelief. Here are a few of my favorites from today’s speech:

Where are the Mandelas? Mandela’s dead.

I think he was going somewhere with this one, but it got lost due to his excitement over the fact that he said the word “Mandela” correctly – let alone that he said it twice. It’s hard to keep a shine on your boots when you kick that much ass.

You need to talk to economists. I think I got a B in Econ 101.

There is no way I believe he got a “B” in Econ. Besides, who is the President to comment on the economy? Those reporters were way out of line.

There is no question that there is some unsettling times in the housing market and credits associated with the housing market.

There is some unsettling times? If he got a “B” in Econ, what did he get in English? Do they give out something lower than “F”? I also find it terrifying that there are troubles in the housing market associated with the housing market.

All of us in America want there to be, you know, fairness when it comes to justice.

Fair Justice? Nah. That’s just an pipe dream.

To the extent that innocent life was lost, you know, I’m saddened

I do know. I’m stoked the president is saddened by the scandalous behavior of a giant American company to the extent that innocent life was lost.

Part of the reason why there’s not this instant democracy in Iraq is because people are still recovering from Saddam Hussein’s brutal rule.

Instant Democracy? Is that a Folgers product?

First of all, notice his picture. One word: awesome. Check. Next, review his statement:

People-with-problems have difficulty finding employment. Let’s raise the living standard and quality-of-life…Competition is good. King County should not hand Boeing Field over to the Port.

To glorify King County, ask that governments make it easier to make movies here. Let’s raise the living standard by getting a larger percentage of our people working. Employment cures many problems and helps some homeless people buy vans.

Governments should make showers available to our people and should give employment as helpers to minimum wage applicants. We could then open our libraries more and investigate more crimes…Unemployment is a huge waste.

Goodspaceguy studied at universities in Germany, Sweden, and America. Goodspaceguy earned a university Master’s and a Bachelor’s degree..

My first thought is, he must have said to himself, “Well, if George W pulled it off, then I’m trying.”

I’m not sure who he’s talking about when he says “people-with-problems”. This could be anyone. I’m guessing he’s referring to people who like blue cars. In that case, I agree. 2-0 for Goodspaceguy. Next, I totally agree with not handing Boeing Field over to the Port. I’m not a pilot myself, but I can imagine that having the airfield under water in the port would make it tricky to land and take off. Check. 3-0 for Goodspaceguy. Second paragraph is a no-brainer. Movies rule. 4-0 for Goodspaceguy.

Now we get into the real meat of his platform. Minimum wage workers who shower = more libraries and crime investigation. I’m surprised not more people have made this connection. 5-0 for Goodspaceguy. Unemployment is a huge waste. Duh. And we’re at 6-0. Goodspaceguy went to school. 7-0.

So, obviously, I’m on board. If this guy keeps on the same Coolness Trajectory, he’s going to have to change his name to Kickingassandtakingnamesamesspaceguy. And, I’m betting he does that before I get cool enough to change my name for the first time. Name suggestions welcome. Names on this list are excluded.

Read his full statement here.

Getting back to the speech, I suppose the benefit of not drinking is that I can remember the stupid things he said. Today’s speech started out with a few nice words about the departed Lady Bird Johnson.

Yesterday America lost an extraordinary first lady and a fine Texan, Lady Bird Johnson. She brought grace to the White House and beauty to our country. On behalf of the American people, Laura and I send our condolences to her daughters, Lynda and Luci, and we offer our prayers to the Johnson family.

On the surface, it sounds pretty good. His delivery has really improved these past few years, hasn’t it? It looks like those remedial high school speech classes he took recently have really helped out. You remember: glance at your notes, read a few lines, then make sure you finish your thought while looking at your audience. Because that shows that you’re not reading the entire speech from your note cards. Did anyone notice, though, that he looked up while saying “an extraordinary first lady and fine Texan” and had to look at his notes to remember her name? Kinda takes a little “something” away from the heartfelt message, don’t you think?

Personally, my favorite part of the speech was when he condescendingly sympathized with our frustrations of being tied up in a war that we started preemptively over falsified reasons.

First of all, I understand why the American people are — you know, they’re tired of the war. People are — there’s war fatigue in America. It’s affecting our psychology. I’ve said this before. I understand that. This is an ugly war. It’s a war in which an enemy will kill innocent men, women and children in order to achieve a political objective. It doesn’t surprise me that there is deep concern amongst our people.

I’m going to ignore the grammatical genius in his phrasing because I don’t want to bite off more than I can chew. I’m also going to ignore the fact that he still doesn’t get that America is a continent, and that our country is the United States of America and that there are other countries here. Countries that don’t start wars for no reason. Instead, I’m going to focus on his recognition that this is an ugly war. Just this particular war is ugly, right? Because most wars are beautiful. Poets write about “beautiful” wars all the time: singing, dancing, and picnics by the light of napalm. I’m also confused about whether he’s talking about us or them when he says, “it’s a war in which an enemy will kill innocent men, women and children in order to achieve a political objective.”

All that aside, I appreciate that he made a karate-chopping motion towards his head at the mention of the word “psychology”. His satisfied smile after the gesture shows his confidence that psychology affects the mind. He feels good about having clarified the matter for those of us listening who might have been confused.

All this leaves me wishing the real Bush was more like the Farrell Bush.

According to Bush’s hometown newspaper, researchers followed lunatics through the voting process in 2004 and found a “correlation between the severity of a person’s psychosis and their preferences for President Bush. The more psychotic the voter, the more likely they were to vote for Bush.”

As if that’s not good enough, Bush supporters aren’t just crazy, they’re morons. “Bush supporters had significantly less knowledge about current issues, government and politics than those who supported Kerry.” I guess not enough stupid nuts watch the Daily Show.

(Side note: This reminds me of that timeless Sofa King We Todd It joke.)

The following was published by CT Now. (It has been reproduced here because it has since been removed from the CT Now website.)

Bush Nuts: Are George W. Bush lovers certifiable?
November 23, 2006
By Andy Bromage

A collective “I told you so” will ripple through the world of Bush-bashers once news of Christopher Lohse’s study gets out.

Lohse, a social work master’s student at Southern Connecticut State University, says he has proven what many progressives have probably suspected for years: a direct link between mental illness and support for President Bush.

Lohse says his study is no joke. The thesis draws on a survey of 69 psychiatric outpatients in three Connecticut locations during the 2004 presidential election. Lohse’s study, backed by SCSU Psychology professor Jaak Rakfeldt and statistician Misty Ginacola, found a correlation between the severity of a person’s psychosis and their preferences for president: The more psychotic the voter, the more likely they were to vote for Bush.

But before you go thinking all your conservative friends are psychotic, listen to Lohse’s explanation.

“Our study shows that psychotic patients prefer an authoritative leader,” Lohse says. “If your world is very mixed up, there’s something very comforting about someone telling you, ‘This is how it’s going to be.’”

The study was an advocacy project of sorts, designed to register mentally ill voters and encourage them to go to the polls, Lohse explains. The Bush trend was revealed later on.

The study used Modified General Assessment Functioning, or MGAF, a 100-point scale that measures the functioning of disabled patients. A second scale, developed by Rakfeldt, was also used. Knowledge of current issues, government and politics were assessed on a 12-item scale devised by the study authors.

“Bush supporters had significantly less knowledge about current issues, government and politics than those who supported Kerry,” the study says.

Lohse says the trend isn’t unique to Bush: A 1977 study by Frumkin & Ibrahim found psychiatric patients preferred Nixon over McGovern in the 1972 election.

Rakfeldt says the study was legitimate, though not intended to show what it did.

“Yes it was a legitimate study but these data were mined after the fact,” Rakfeldt says. “You can ask new questions of the data. I haven’t looked at” Lohse’s conclusions regarding Bush, Rakfeldt says.

“That doesn’t make it illegitimate, it just wasn’t part of the original project.”

For his part, Lohse is a self-described “Reagan revolution fanatic” but said that W. is just “beyond the pale.”