My team sucks, but it is OK.

I had to make a choice; who would it be, McCain or Obama? It should be so easy: Obama. He is clearly more intellectual and more positive about the future. But I found my self looking for any reason not to vote for him. Was this just me being my contrarian self, wishing to go against the hordes around me saying that Obama was the messiah? Using the logic that goes something like this: if everyone is doing it, it must not be good, or was it something deeper? McCain after all is probably one of my all-time favorite politicians. He was and probably still is a maverick as much as a senator can be. He was a republican that actually took stands for the environment. He made his mistakes along the way but, much in the way that fortune favors the bold, if you step out on too many limbs, sooner or later they are going to break. Still the answer should have been easy. He had turned to the dark side; he was Anakan Skywalker under the influence of the Emperor. Things were getting complicated; emotions were replacing logic as a way to make decisions. Was I becoming no better than those I ridiculed for basing there choice on irrational unstudied emotion? It was like I was watching the Gators play the Seminoles for the national title. Why couldn’t one of them have just lost? It would make things easy, instead of being torn up by what you were and by what you would be. Growing up in family where everyone went to FSU, you become indoctrinated into rooting for them, but then you end up going to school at UF. All logic says that you should cheer the Gators on to victory; they are who you are and will be. Then why’s it is so hard and what makes anything about what team you cheer for logical? Maybe this was the key: logic is not important. It was time to step back and write my self in for president, logic be damned. They told me I was throwing away my vote, fore whatever that means. But if I had told them I was a fan of the Tampa Bay Rays before this year, they would never ask me why I don’t pick a team that has a chance of winning, now why should I start now.

I think that had written this a week earlier it would have gone something like this letter to the editor by Josh Burkard:

This political season has been tough for me. So far, I’ve avoided thinking about it by focusing on giving congressional offices an earful about the $700 billion they just flushed down the toilet.

Eventually, I had to make a choice. Both candidates seem to want to repeat the mistakes of the Great Depression, but my friends urged me not to “throw my vote away” on a third party. I didn’t know what to do, and I started to feel a little distraught.

Then I saw the ObamaBot and realized I was overthinking things.
I need to be more like that robot. Waving signs. Spouting prerecorded sound bites. After all, this is a movement, and everyone wants to be a part of something big.

Who could argue with the thousands of stickers and signs on campus? It’s time for me to stop worrying about empty political promises or the $35,000 of debt each of us owes.

It’s time to join the winning team.

At this point I could show the logic and the science behind why we desire to be part of a group and expand on the values of voting for third party, but why? Does it even matter? So join the crowd I will if only to see my team go down in defeat. Sometimes the loudest supporters come for the team that knows they are not going to win and they are happy with that. Just ask the fans of the Werner Southern basketball team.

In an ending note I wonder if when things have all been said and done, McCain will end up just like Anaka/Darth Vader and kill the Emperor or will he end up being another puppet of the Emperor.