For Americans who aren't privy to Canadian news, our country has gone to the dogs in the last week. For months, there has been an ongoing investigation into a sponsorship scandal involving the our ruling Liberal Party which occured in the Province of Quebec. For a long time, it looked as though the Gomery Commission wouldn't find anything, in fact Canadian bloggers began to refer to it as the 'Gomery Pyle' Commission. Former PM Jean Chretien was called before inquiry and made it seem foolish, completely embarassing Justice Gomery and opposition counsel.

This past week, things turned completely against the Liberals, and now it appears that our wingnuts are poised to trigger and election they are likely to win. There is much more at stake here than a simple election, legislation of global importance is on the line.

Might just be time to scrap that 'move to Canada' idea...

As we are forced to acknowledge that we have lost this election, the time has come to look forward. The question now arises as to who are the potential candidates. Everyone is aware of the standard candidates, but there are other excellent fringe candidates as well:

1.) John Edwards - Former Senator from North Carolina, Former VP Candidate - A lot of people here seem to really like him. I think he's a terrible candidate and given that he'll be out of the spotlight for the next four years I don't think he has a chance. He's not even the best choice from North Carolina.

As much as I would love to see this result turned around, I just don't see it happening. Instead, I'm starting to look ahead to '06 and hoping we can get control of the senate.

Looking ahead to who is up in '06, we have 16 Republicans, 17 Democrats and Jeffords. In those numbers, we have quite a few prominent Senators - Teddy Kennedy, Rick Santorum, Hilary Clinton, Bill Frist, Joe Biden, Dianne Feinstein, Lincoln Chafee and more.

This is the time of year when many politicos are suffering from poll-overdose. Each day we get a new tracking poll, a new national poll, a slew of regional polls and we look for the most minute details in each. The fact of the matter, though, is that in almost every poll of import the leader is within the margin of error.

Kerry's up in two straight polls in Ohio, who cares. Bush has been up recently in Florida, who cares. Bush is up a tiny bit nationally, who cares. In every case the result is within the margin of error and thus inconclusive at best, completely meaningless at worst.

This entire election is going to come down to turnout, enthusiasm and a belief about who can win. Even the weather is going to be important. What if it rains in Miami? Or if there is snow in Denver? The most minute detail could turn this election.

What we need now, it not more slogging through of polls, but a profound effort to raise the level of enthusiasm amongst the general public. Instead of spending our days pouring through newspapers, news sites and blogs, lets get out and bring back the old spirit of campaignin.

I'll be in Cleveland this weekend. Where will you be?

It's rapidly becoming apparent that Sen. Kerry and President Bush are running very different campaigns in the month of October. Just take a look at where the candidates are campaigning and what they're saying. Pretty quickly, it becomes apparent that the two men are talking to a vastly different audience.

Both candidates went to Wisconsin. Bush visited only Oskosh, a small town almost certain to support the President by a large majority. Kerry, on the other hand, spent an entire day in Wisconsin visiting small towns and major cities alike. On October 14th, both candidates were in Vegas - Bush to speak to Republican governors, Kerry to speak to the AARP. The President is persistently speaking in areas he is certain to win. The Senator, on the other hand, appears to be trying to speak to a far broader spectrum.

In terms of what they're saying, Bush is now almost entirely negative and lauds what his administration has, supposedly, done in the past. He is barely saying anything about the next four years and he has also started moving further to the right. Take his comments about the Dred Scott case in the 2nd debate. While that seemed like nonsense to most people, far right neocons like Bush and his cronies often refer to Roe v Wade as Dred Scott II. Senator Rick Santorum (R, Pennsylvania) has even used that analogy in public. Was Bush slyly trying to tell his base that he would nominate justices who opposed abortion? Kerry, on the other hand, is playing to the middle. Some people might say that he has gone negative, but the Senator is merely attacking the record of the administration. He is not throwing around labels, he has yet to get up on a stage and refer to Bush as a "neocon". Instead he speaks of a record of losing jobs, lower income and a quagmire in Iraq.

The differences may seem like minor issues, but their underlying implications are extremely important. President Bush is appealing to his base, all but giving up hope on middle America. Kerry, on the other hand, seems content to assume the far left will support him in sufficient numbers and is appealing to the middle. Bush's political guru Karl Rove believes that 4 million evangelicals did not turn out to vote in 2000. The Bush strategy seems to be to get every single evangelical in the country to vote, and assume those increased numbers will turn the tide their way. Kerry is catering to those hit by the Bush Presidency but who feel comfortable with him as commander-in-chief. Fewer than 20% of these undecideds believe Bush deserves to be re-elected (Zogby) but still they do not trust Kerry (as seen in the NYT poll). Perhaps there is no secret plan, but merely one which has been forced upon the candidates. Is Kerry's appeal to the middle simply the result of a Nader candidacy? Is Bush's plan just because of an abysmal record on jobs? In either case, the concept of a Bush victory and the implications it carries are frightening.

This election is not just a choice between left and right, it presents a grand question on the state of our democracy. Have we, almost two-hundred and fifty years after the birth of our nation, reached a point where winning an election no longer requires compromise but merely fanaticism?