As we've moved closer to November 6, I have for weeks and weeks been ticking off the days eagerly, just waiting (a) for President Obama to be reelected and (b) for the threat of Mitt Romney in the Oval Office to recede to a mere bad memory (like the prospect of a Sarah Palin vice presidency). Now, though, as we sit exactly two weeks out, I'm wondering if whether I'd like a little more time back...pushing the election ever so slightly further out and giving the President more time to halt what seems to be Romney momentum.
Call me neurotic, but I've been checking the InTrade betting odds like a madman -- probably 40 times a day -- for the last two months. I've seen the President's odds reach the glorious highs of 80/20, only to sink to about 58/42 as I type this. At this moment, I'm hoping for reassurance from FiveThirtyEight's Nate Silver tonight; his forecast model has been more stubbornly bullish about President Obama's chances than many of the online bettors have been over the last couple of weeks. Right now, though, I'm scared...quite honestly scared. I feel as though a sword is hanging over my head, inasmuch as it's hanging over the head of the country in which I live.
Right now, as I type, I'm shivering in the dark, cold shadow of the Sword of Romney-cles.
The disastrous implications of a Romney win cannot be overstated. A Romney win, in my judgment, would ring the death knell of the country I love and in which I believe deeply.
* Almost certainly, a Romney win would lead to the overturning of Roe v. Wade, given that multiple Supreme Court justices are septuagenarians and in light of the fact that the Court's pro-choice balance is ever so delicate.
* A President Romney would gut funding for Planned Parenthood and other critical women's health programs, thereby not only restricting women's reproductive health with respect to abortion, but also undermining access to the very contraceptives that make abortion less often needed.
* As President, Mitt Romney would be destined to add fuel to the fire that is America's Military Industrial Complex, overfunding the military, attempting to expand the American empire of military bases and foreign entanglements, and quite possibly leading us into a catastrophic military engagement with Iran that not only would drain us of tax dollars and resources but also precious American blood.
And that's not even to mention the damage Romney has threatened to inflict on our economy with regard to taxation, healthcare and the widening chasm between the haves and the have-nots.
I'm not a worry troll. I'm a passionate Democrat who'd rather not be beheaded by the Sword of Romney-cles. Until this election is over, I can't help but feel like I -- and my country -- am standing mere steps away from a teetering blade.
