Obamania strikes China

When talking about the US election to people in China it becomes very clear that the Chinese will be very surprised if McCain wins. Not because Obama has a 8 point lead in the polls, but because the Chinese have no idea who John McCain is. They know who Obama is or at least they see his picture in the papers, but there's no presence of McCain here. Maybe it's because Obama is more of a celebrity in his own right and is sort of cool, and the Chinese are obsessed with all things cool in America. America's influence here, more then the usual chain of McDonalds or Wall-Marts is the perception that America defines cool. I've even met one student here who wears baggy cloths likes rap and just generally wants to be a gangster. Most of the students don't really know or care about American politics, in fact it's pretty hard to find out how much they care about Chinese politics. That's the thing about living in what is essentially a repressive state it's hard to find out what people really think. It's not like you see the effects of the government everywhere here, there aren't exactly stormtroopers marching down the street, but nether are there political rallies or associations, I suppose there's one political association but I think they pretty much run things.

I finally decided who I was going to vote for after a long period of fence sitting. I've always liked John McCain, in fact he's still by far my favorite politician. He's stood up to his own party in ways that are just much braver then you usually see. He's a pragmatist who seems to be the only person left in Congress actually concerned with the deficit, and I just trust him more to lead the country during a war. On the other hand I'm sick to death of Bush and everything like Bush, and while McCain certainly isn't Bush, I'm just not sure he's enough of a change. On top of that I probably agree with Obama on slightly more issues and I hope that with a huge Democratic majority they can actually get something done. As a rule I generally like a congress of one party and a president of another so they do as little as possible, but things have gotten out of hand in the last 8 years. So I was pretty much on the fence about it for a long time. I finally decided the other day to vote for Obama breaking the tie essentially with DC voting. I've always been amazed that people can just sit by while DC residents are denied there basic rights and that the people of DC never seemed particularly disturbed by it either. I think with a Democratic president and congress there might finally be some change. Honestly who knows if my vote will count I had to send in a federal backup ballot since my absentee ballot still isn't here. And even if it does count it's not like Obama is taking DC by 1 vote. But living in a place where there are no elections at all it seems a real shame not to vote, and besides I never really liked fence sitters.