Election Elation

    I know it's been about a week, but I still feel the same elation I felt on Election Night. Not just President Obama's supporters, but every American should still feel that thrill. Why? … Because the campaign is finally over! No more speeches, no more commercials, and best of all – no more of those annoying phone calls. I also assumed that the emails would stop. Unfortunately, the day after the election, I received an email from President Obama's campaign manager. At the end of it was the word, "Donate." He's still asking for money? Does Obama plan on running for a third term?

This $2 billion dollar campaign -- that's "Billion" with a "B" -- was a nasty campaign. Based on the commercials they endorsed, neither of the candidates seemed particularly nice. After each debate and major commercial, independent groups told us how untruthful many of their statements were. I propose that for the next election, there should be an independent commission set up to evaluate each commercial. If it's found to be untruthful, the candidate who endorsed that commercial will have to pay an amount equal to what that commercial cost to his or her opponent's campaign. Good-bye untruthful commercials.

While most of us are thrilled that the campaign is over, there are those politicos who are dreamily thinking, "Only about 1,460 days until the next Presidential election." -- or right after they finish counting this election's votes in Florida. What's with Florida and elections? How hard can it be? A few high school kids with a Mac could probably have handled it. 

If you were the Governor of Florida and you had more political aspirations, wouldn't you have made sure that your state at least moved into the 20^th Century on Election Day this time? In some Miami precincts, voters were still casting their ballots while Obama was making his victory speech. They must've felt great about how meaningful their votes were.

It's easy to pick on Florida – boy is it easy – but it's not the only state that is goofy at election time. Here in California, on Election Day, we don't just vote for people. As you know, we vote for laws. Lots of them. These are laws that even experts who study the issues for years have trouble deciding on and evaluating their economic impact. They deal with taxation, education, the rights of public employees, and everything else they can squeeze onto the ballot. When I first moved here years ago, I didn't get it. I asked anyone who would listen that if we decide all these issues, what do the state legislators do? Nobody could ever answer that. 

I had a favorite ballot measure this year. It was the one that asked us to decide if male porn actors should be required to wear condoms while making their films. In other words, on that night we had to settle both election and erection issues.

In case you missed the big news, the measure passed. I'm happy to say that I voted on the winning side on this one. Regardless of the practicality of the proposition, I felt that if I could do a little something to possibly help save someone's life, I should. However, there was another motivation behind my vote. When I thought about how they could possibly enforce this law, I figured that before any porn movie could be released, either there would have to be a state official who watched a screening of the porn flick, or they'd have to have an official on the set of every porn movie checking to make sure there were no naked penises. "Finally," I thought, "there's going to be something for those legislators to do."