Missing the Debate

I missed the debate. And then I had a chance to watch a re-run and opted to do some work instead. I dunno, the VP debate just doesn't get it going for me. Frankly, the Bush-Kerry debate didn't get it going for me either. I think this is an important election and I don't think we have a good candidate.

We need a major re-thinking of the war on Terror (a misnomer, me thinks - we should be calling it a War against Islamo-faciscm) and neither Bush nor Kerry provides it. Bush is sticking to his plan, which some days I think is working and other days think it's about to fall completely apart.

Kerry provides a hopeful, but I feel, ultimately, wrong alternative. I feel as though he is slipping back into treating Islamic Fascism as a fundamentally criminal problem that can be solved with cooperation amongst civil-minded countries. This is the approach we've taken for nearly 30 years and have seen the problem get worse and worse. We must at some point acknowledge that OBL and Al Queda are not Mafiosos, but faith-based, pan-Arab, Sunni fundamentalists interested in mostly political and religious objectives and NOT money and strictly power.

A determined, patient, and angry foe has declared war on us. As much as we would not like to fight a war, it is not a choice we have, it is a decision to recognize a declared enemy or to pretend he doesn't really exist as a major problem. This act of denial is negligent and I think cowardly on a moral level.