BUT WHAT WOULD BE THE ANSWER TO THE ANSWER MAN?
-Grateful Dead, "St. Stephen"

Over at CalJunket (an awesome blog, btw), Rebecca Brown has questions, and being a registered voter of some sort, I have answers... or I think I do... anyhoo...

Is anyone besides me bothered by the fact that voters vote for whom they think will win and not the candidate whom they think would be the best leader?

While the factual answer to that question is likely "yes!", I don't think this is necessarily an either/or situation. I think a lot of Democratic voters will go to the polls (and have already gone) with a synthesis of those two overlapping concerns in mind. Given the nature of our nominating system and the challenge of campaigning against a perceived "popular wartime preznit", the ability to beat Bush -- and I'm a little worn out on the E-word right now -- is a factor in the decision-making process of Democratic voters. And rightfully so: Painting with a broad brush, Dean, Clark, Edwards and Kerry would all lead the country in a relatively comparable way (all better than Bush, mind you). However, their differences in their perceived general-election weaknesses (Dean's lack of military service, Kerry's "northeastern-liberal"-ishness) are, at present, larger than their differences in leadership and policy.

I think Dennis Kucinich would make an excellent president. I also think Bush would have a damn easy time scaring middle-America and culturally pigeon-holing the Congressman from Ohio.

Does it annoy anyone else that political media coverage is devoted to speculation rather than analysis of the candidates' ideologies and issues?

Oh that's a big hell yes. Of course, Gore got the same speculative, non-substantive treatment back in 2000, and the focus on trivial bullshit, from "inventing the internet" to "Love Story" and so on, overshadowed the staggering policy differences between he and Dubya, caused voters to believe that very little was at stake that year, etc. And now we're one bad day at work for O'Connor or Rhenquist from some real bad consequences. Oh, and there was that whole imperial oil-war thing. Dang it.

Is anyone else bothered that genuine diversity of political thought is drowned out by a cry for simplicity and the demeaning of "fringe candidates"?

Yes, I can't remember seeing Dennis on TV for more than 10-seconds in the past month. The media basically got fed up covering him, the thinking being something like "at least with Reverend Al, we get jokes". I saw him speak way back in the spring, and I was impressed (save for his incomplete and carefully-worded explanation of his abortion flipflop). I'm happy that his constituency ran within the party rather than without (he proudly stated, "I'm a green Democrat!" at the event), but the way the media has treated him has been a shame.

Do any of my readers thirst for a more intellectualized political atmosphere not driven by television ratings but by consumer advocacy?

Well, 1) I'm more of a hunger guy, 2) I'm an animal, then I'm a human, then I'm a person, then I'm a musican, and then I'm a consumer, and 3) If "consumer advocacy" is a code-word for His Holiness Saint Lazy-Eye, then that's "Bush advocacy by proxy", though 4) If not, then yes!

UPDATE: Oh, I almost forgot to link to this post from Kossack Chris Bowers, on some strikingly similar issues.