NP: Deftones, White Pony

Okay, I've been hesitant to say much of anything, but not for any reasons you'd think. I just don't want to kick the Mancow story off the front page of the site.

I seem to be coping with Tuesday's result (Wednesday's result?) by turning into a bad stand-up comedian. To wit, perhaps literally:

• Bush's re-election is not the end of the world. And if it is the end of the world, no one is going to be around to say "I told you so" anyway.
• If you thought the election proved how much of the country is very religious, it's even moreso than you think, now that the rest of us will be praying every day that no one on the Supreme Court is forced to resign after lip-synching on Saturday Night Live.
• Personally, since I'm probably too old to get drafted, I think I'm okay as long as I don't get pregnant or suddenly decide to marry a dude.

That last one is only a sort of half-joke. I feel like I'm shifting into survival mode, which says that there's not much that can be done to negatively affect my life to any great degree as a result of this particular election. Others around me, maybe not so much, but for the moment, I'm looking out for number one here, because I don't feel like I can count on the opposition leadership for much help.

More to the point, there's no valid third option. Period. Maybe if Bush veers as hard to the right as some are fearing, there may be an opportunity to galvanize the center into a discrete entity. I don't know. It might be time to put that theory to the test.

Overall, I'm back to my two over-arching mantras. First, the prayer of serenity. I can't change what happened in this election, so I have to focus on things I can change. No amount of beating my head against the wall is going to make anything different. Being pragmatic means never having to shrivel in the corner and keep crying "this isn't happening."

Second, if you can't laugh about bad things, you don't deserve to be able to laugh at good things. Bad things can, and I would suggest MUST, be funny and laughed at.

Does this election change things in the big picture? Almost certainly. Does it change me? No way.