To Supersoulty and John Ford

[12th Doctor]

Mark,

I am fine now, I just had one of my moments of extreme doubt last night.  I get those occationally, but so did Lincoln and Adams, so I guess it isn't that bad.

What makes these things worse is that all my friends and family look to me to reassure them that Bush will win in Nov.  While I constantly have to reassure others, there is never anyone there to reassure me.  All I ever see is Bush bashing.

[12th Doctor]

What makes these things worse is that all my friends and family look to me to reassure them that Bush will win in Nov.  While I constantly have to reassure others, there is never anyone there to reassure me.  All I ever see is Bush bashing.

Did you hear the clip of Bush responding to a question about Indian tribe sovereignty at the UNITY conference of minority journalists? It was a trainwreck. It seriously sounded like he had no idea what the word even meant. It was deeply disturbing.  He kept talking in circles about how sovereignty means you're sovereign and sh!t like that.  They have to do a better job of screening these appearances.

[Q] Good morning. My name is Mark Trahant. I'm the editorial page editor of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and a member of the Native American Journalist Association. (Applause.) Most school kids learn about the government in the context of city, county, state and federal. And, of course, tribal governments are not part of that at all. Mr. President, you've been a governor and a President, so you have a unique experience, looking at it from two directions. What do you think tribal sovereignty means in the 21st century, and how do we resolve conflicts between tribes and the federal and the state governments?

[BUSH]: Tribal sovereignty means that, it's sovereign. You're a -- you've been given sovereignty, and you're viewed as a sovereign entity. And, therefore, the relationship between the federal government and tribes is one between sovereign entities.

I know this is a minority conference, but what the Hell kind of question is that?  I'm sure that Tribal Sovereignty is a huge issue to .01% of the population, but it isn't big on most Americans' radars and I don't hink most people, including Bush and Kerry, have given it much thought anythime it the past... I don't know... life time.

[12th Doctor]

Soulty- ah yes, what Churchill used to call his "black dog" moods. I get those too. They make it seem like life is hardly worth living. But then there are the other times when the world seems incredibly beautiful and nothing that is bad really matters, and those can make the whole deal worth it.

Yes.

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Not so much "isolationism", I think, so much as it is this "me first" attitude.  People only seem to care about what feels good to them now.  After 9/11, it felt good to get back at those terrorists bastards.  Afterwords, though, people fell away from commitment to a long term strategy to fight terror when they discovered that it would take more than a few months and probably many lives.

All of a sudden, what Bush says doesn't "feel good" anymore because no one wants to have to deal with commitment.  What Kerry says apparently "feels good" to a lot of people, because it lacks commitment to any priciples or the will to hunker down for the long term and deal with the causes of our problems.