Back Again

School has started -- almost halfway through the fall semester. I'm in a routine, sort of. Car pooling with several other people from Steinbach to Providence. Teaching class. Reading and assessing essays. Learning to know new people and situations, and trying to keep a genuine awareness of God at the heart of the whole process.

We've just finished an election in Canada. That vote was pretty easy for me: Go Green! It's a protest vote in our riding, where the Conservative candidate takes almost twice as many votes as all other candidates combined. I'm also hoping to help the Green Party gain enough of a percentage to get people's attention, especially political type people.

We could vote in the American election too, based on dual citizenship; but somehow I don't feel right voting twice. So I vote where I live at the moment. If I did vote in the States, again it would be an easy call. I have opposed the invasion of Iraq from the beginning, and the primary recourse our system has for expressing such opposition is by voting against the architects and their supporters.

Whoever wins (McCain or Obama), I feel more hopeful about the future. It's a funny thing that: I hear one person after another talking as though, if the other guy wins, we're doomed! Obama will be the end of freedom in our country! McCain will take us to war with everyone else! I doubt it. Both of them seem to me to represent positive change in our foreign policy. They differ more at home, but congress carries the greater responsibility to pass any legislation proposed. I'm looking forward to a change.

Bush? I feel real regret. I supported him once, and wish I still could; but the course he has taken have pushed me right away. I'm looking forward to the next presidency. It won't fix very much, but at least I hope it won't invade anyone else.