In 1968 my elementary school teacher said the election was really close, and that she was in favor of Richard Nixon, although she respected Wallace for not giving up even though he was far behind, and for saying, ‘I’ll win yet.’ In the school playground, I said Humphrey must have something going for him, since she had after all said that the election was close. The response from other kids was No, ‘there goes Humphrey down the drain!’, accompanied with the sound of toilets flushing.

Four years later, I was in a junior high where the school was solidly behind McGovern, and I tried to stand up for Nixon, to see the other side, and was similarly shouted down. Two years after that, I visited my relatives, who were solidly against Nixon, and I defended him, saying he just had the media against him. He did, but that didn’t make his relative inability to harness a liberal media didn’t make him right in his use of executive privilege to say whatever the president does, is right. America had fought a revolution over this sort of thing, and he was still wrong.

In America’s bicentennial year, I voted for the first time—for Ford, and persuaded my grandparents, too, to vote for Ford, and he won our state (Oregon)—but lost the nation. I had a great time saying for four years in the midst of escalating inflation and an Afghanistan hostage situation, ‘Don’t blame me. I voted for Ford.’

Four years later, the nation also repudiated Carter. The media had tried to project a tight race, but I knew it would be a landslide, and it was—by 9.00 pm, the race was over and Reagan had won.

Four years later, I voted for Reagan again—less enthusiastically, because he had not filled some campaign pledges. It was another landslide, and understandably so—Mondale looked foolish trying to blame Reagan for not talking to Soviets, when the real problem was that Breshnev, Chernenko, Andropov all kept dropping.

Four years later, I voted third party—not happy over Bush, not willing to vote for Dukakis. Four years after that, I voted write-in, again not enthused over Bush and not excited about Clinton.

The first two years of Clinton’ presidency were such a disaster of rampant ideology that it triggered the first Republican take-over of the House in decades to restore some balance in government and brought people like me back to the fold. I voted for Dole in 1996, and had a great time for four years after that, through Monica Lewinski and impeachment proceedings, seeing again, as in Nixon’s case, a president look out for himself and put himself before the nation, to be willing to let the whole government ground to a halt as long as he could defend himself against indefensible behavior.

As Clinton resembled Nixon, Bush II resembled LBJ. I had no idea the 2000 election would be THAT close—I think hardly anyone did. People don’t seem to remember that Clinton’s elections had been close, too—Clinton had won his first term with only 43% or so of the vote in a three-way race. And, just as the Republicans had put up an uninspiring candidate in 1996 against an incumbent, so did the Democrats in 2004.

And now, in 2008, for the first time, we have two older party men—McCain and Biden—who have run for president before, and both of whom have failed, although McCain got much further than Biden did in past campaigns—perhaps the absence of plagiarism helped. And in 2008 we also have two younger leaders—Obama and Palin—who have excited people in the way the elders haven’t been able to. My own excitement about the Republican ticket has increased since Palin joined.

Here’s how things look to me on 2008 September 10, regarding the Electoral Map:

Obama takes Hawaii, McCain takes Alaska. Obama takes the Pacific coast states, plus picks up enough of the filth vote to take Nevada. McCain takes the next group of states, even Montana (overcoming the recent Democratic surge there), but loses New Mexico due to a heavy Hispanic vote that goes Democratic. McCain takes the South, overcoming a tight vote in Georgia where Bob Barr almost splits the Republican vote, but people don’t want to waste their votes or throw the election to Obama, so they don’t take the bait. Obama takes Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan and, in a squeaker, Iowa. McCain takes Indiana, Ohio and West Virginia. From Pennsylvania east, and north of Virginia, Obama takes it all, including New Hampshire in a squeaker.

Result: a 269-269 electoral tie.