I was hoping, of course, that Nader (and, to a lesser extent, the Green party in general) would do well enough to make a point, and maybe even get some federal money for the next campaign.

I voted almost exactly the same way Rebecca (mars) voted above on the California state referenda. I voted against my Berkeley Assembleywoman, one Ms. Wainwright, because she had the temerity to draft, sponsor, and pass Berkeley's first antinudity law.

The highlights of my voting experience were three: 1) The crowd of stoners ahead of me who reeked of pot and staggered under the weight of their pro-medical-marijuana buttons and T-shirts; 2) the warm feeling I get about my neighbors and my neighborhood when I see everyone voting; and 3) when my girlfriend grabbed me in the polling place and kissed me and said, "Democracy makes me feel sexy."

caleb donaldson {caleb@cyborganic.com}

Now 99% do not know who this person is, and using the given clues may require some ACTUAL THOUGHT expendidture on your part.

I am proud to say I did not vote with Dumb Democrats and Bimbos-for-Clinton. Who knew that there are so many stupid (and dead) people still voting. 44 scandals and 56 dead witnesses in just the last 4 years--not including the innocent bystanders and unlucky fellow airplane passengers of 28 of these people in a position to testify against the Criminal Clinton. And what about the Criminal Clinton's involvement in the Tokyo Subway bombing, OK City, Value-Jet, Waco and Ruby Ridge? How many dead bodies will pile up before someone says "Enough!" The greatest assault on the Bill of Rights in 120 years--promoted by the Bill of Wrongs. Those of you who would sacrifice your freedom for a little "security" are deserving of neither. the slowest growing economy in 100 years-- do not get me started on this one.

If anyone has stayed tuned this far, I vote for the only man of principle, Harry Browne, Libertarian Party, the party of Jefferson, the party of freedom.

Glen Sorensen {sorensen@adnc.com}

Yikes. I voted for Nader, especially after hearing (via Drudge Report) that Clinton won at around noon (PST). Nader would be quite an amusing president, but I think we'd be looking at four years of gridlock and chaos.

Note to the Reform Party: Run a candidate in 2000 who isn't a total nutball and you'll have a fighting chance.

I'd PAY to see Tauscher (bay area rep. who BARELY beat republican Bill Baker) unload a FAT can o' Whoop Ass™ on Billy Baker's sanctimonious face. It probably would have been enough just to watch him sweat as his lead fell and fell.

Thing to be thankful for:

Three words: Line Item Veto - the Republicans asked for it, they got it!

David Isbister {david_isbister@globalvillage.com}

This decision was the result of not a few heated disputes between me and friends that sent other friends reeling from the room rolling their eyes. Mostly I didn't want to repeat the experience of last election (my first) wherein i voted for clinton as an experiment-- to see what we would get by helping to elect the first Democrat I would really be aware of-- and had to spend election night in a room full of bushy-tailed Clinton enthusiasts bawling out Fleetwood Mac and Bob Dylan's "The times they are a changin'". All the while suspecting that if people my age could use only cultural signifiers dating from before they were cognizant or even born to relate to the political process that, as a friend put it at the time, "the shit's buried that much deeper." So this time i helped make up the 2.4% of California that voted for the hope of something else. Not Perot because he's a loon and I would never want a CEO to head our country. And not, speaking of freedom and autocracy, for Harry Browne because I think libertarianism is a hopelessly outdated, simple and narrow philosophy to bring to an increasingly complex, de-centralized, inter-dependent world.

That done I went on and spent time on local politics questions, something it's easy to forget in the world I crudely described above, but that's as least as important as spending time on the web yakking about who i voted for for President and almost as important as walking down the street with the sun in your eyes.

sandy {sandy@hotwired.com}

Matt {mdale@up.net}

Erys {abenoy@apcc.com}

The two party system is the height of foolishness, it makes it impossible to reach contructive compromises when combined with the geographical representation of the House and Senate. If one has a federal system, then why is it necessary to have the federal government elected geographically? What is local government for? The federal government should be elected on a proportional representation (PR) basis, nationwide. People would then vote for parties, not for people and hopefully at some point people would begin to vote issues, not personalities. One post described PR as being unstable (just look at Italy). Well not all countries that have PR are have unstable governments. Germany, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Ireland all have some form of PR. None of these governments are particularly unstable.

I think it was Thomas Jefferson who said that a revolution every once in a while was a good thing. The United States is long overdue.

Durrin {dxh@gv.dk}

The reason I didn't vote: for one, the practical. I'm living in one state, and registered in another. There was nothing to make me feel I wanted to go to the trouble to vote. Plus, I had another motive. As one who is severely discontented and distraught with our national politics (and perhaps everything else), I felt that the statistic I would most want to be a part of would be that of all those who DID NOT VOTE. I had sinister hopes that those numbers would reach an all-time high (did they? I have yet to find out). I know that my logic is not "all there," but I found the experience somewhat liberating. Even though I'm not the typical nonvoter (I'm guessing) -- I even watch C-Span semi-regularly -- I felt free not to get involved in the petty wranglings of attack ads, especially on the local and state levels. (I'm living in New Jersey, home of a "gutter race." When nasty commercials came on, I didn't have to feel remotely interested -- due to my prior commitment not to vote.)

I expect many people will not agree with my behavior this election year, but then many of the above who did vote said that they questioned the value of doing so.

rob middleton {robmid@aol.com}

I survive by living on social security disability because many "sighted" employers get pissed off that I cannot read them a page of a newspaper.

Anyway, I am very patriotic. When I was 18 (a few years back), I was taken from the school for the blind in Hartford, Connecticut to the State Armory for my physical to join the military. I got my draft card and was going to do my civic duty. Anyway her I was naked kin a line of many people pulling schemes of all types to get out of going in. Anyway, I passed every test with flying colors, and was about to take the visual test. The man called me up, and said, "Look at the sign on the wall!", (actually he backed it). Me being blind and honest replied, "What sign?", "The sign on the wall you dummy!!!" he angrally barked. "What wall??", and I wasn't kidding either.

You need to go sit in the other line. So I did, and that was the line to talk to a shrink about why I was trying to get out. The only way I proved to them I was blind was by asking the doctor to go to the window. I asked him if he say a guy sitting on top of a station wagon reading a newspaper? The doctor said yes he did. I asked the doctor to read me the sign that was on the side of the car. He read "The Connecticut Institute for the Blind". Anyway I war demoted for 1-Y which meant in a national emergency I would go.

When I comes to elections I am also patriotic. I take my guide dog into the booth, and wish myself luch. I voted for Mr. Bill because I feel he was the less of three evils.

Let's face it Mr. Pineapple is very out of touch with reality on many issues. During the debates the only thing he could say was "15% Tax Cut"! That's fine but when asked where it was going to come from, and how the other parts of his program were to be funded he then got on the character issue wagon.

As for Mr. Texas if he were a real viable candidate he would be in the race from day one, and stay there, not hop in and out like a golfer with bad shoes. He too had nothing constructive to say except for the character issue.

Let's face it many politicians today have something in their collective closets. Maybe not as bad as others, but something never the less.

Howard Geltman {HGeltman@AOL.COM}

misuba {misuba@aaln.org}

For Bob Dole

Not because I thought that he was great and had great ideas... But because I didn't want to see Clinton serve another term! I was a sargeant in the U.S. Army, and personally witnessed the destruction of the United States militarty!

He took it from being the greatest power in the known world, to being the weakest military known to date...

Most people don't realize what he did by downsizing the military, but they soon will, the next major conflict that occurs is going to upset a lot of people when they realize that the organization that is responsible for protecting them isn't large enough, or powerful enough anymore to do the job!

You see, the balanced budget that Clinton keeps talkin about is a result of basically cutting down our countries defenses!

There is hardly a defense left, just a bare skeleton of what we used to have...

But you'll never hear that from the media, because the liberals support Clinton, and what the Son of a Bitch stands for!

And yet, you all elected him for a second term...

I hope and pray for the sake of the U.S. that we have no reason to defend our country in the next 4 years, because if it comes down to that, we aren't going to win....

Dean Murphy {dmurphy@stlnet.com}

Conal Garrity {fios@bitstream.net}

Robin Miller {roblimo@primenet.com}

This election cycle was a fucked up ride for me. I got into far too many arguments with people who couldn't understand that much of the reason I could not in good conscience vote for Bill Clinton was his disregard for civil liberties. I guess most of them still feel the "lesser of two evils" arguments makes sense, and showed them the Way. I'm not sure that idea ever worked for me anyway, but it surely didn't make sense to me this year.

Maybe I'm greedy. Maybe it's naive or foolish to want more. To want to believe in something. A lot of people seem to feel betrayed by Clinton. I merely feel betrayed by myself, because I fell for the ruse 4 years ago. Clinton's campaign and persona last time around was a lot like advertising that whores the human trait of passion into a commodity to sell fragrances under the slogan "just be", as if we're not supposed to be intelligent enough to realize that if we're just being, we don't need a fucking frangrance. Clinton whored the human trait of passion 4 years ago. And he did it most of all to our generations, the "younger" generations (can I still be called "young" at 27?) -- gorups of people who I think, although they often don't allow themselves to admit it to themselves or each other, is only so jaded and cynical because they do want to believe, they do want to feel passion about things that matter, and about each other.

It's odd. I'm not ashamed that I didn't vote for a Presidential candidate. I'm ashamed that I did vote for one last time.

I did vote, however. For whatever reasons, and despite everything else so many of us feel about political life, I guess in some way I believe in voting. Granted, it had more of a ceremonial feel back in NY, which also has the large metal booths with the looming lever to close the curtain. It felt important, the physical movements themselves. Ok, so we punch holes here; still important. And I tried to be smart about it, opting to not vote for those few propositions or races I didn't feel I had learned enough about.

And I could have, I suppose, picked someone to vote for in the Presidential race. Maybe I just didn't want to betray myself again. In any number of parts of my life, I want to believe certain things are possible, and that I can allow myself to have passion about things I want, need, feel, desire, care about, find important, consider crucial.

And half of my friends would tell me it's naive to feel that way. It's stupid to believe in the possibilities.

And I guess I find that sort of sad, that maybe the cynicism of others doesn't come from frustrated idealism the way mine does. That maybe an increasing number of people just don't believe in possibility.

Then again, someone here said that Nader wasn't on the ballot in their state so they "figured out how to write him in anyway". That rules. I don't know why, but it does.

baby-X {baby-x@slack.net}

Light Touch {mcollins@mo.net}

deepee {dbond@dmi.net}

America should be ashamed. You deserve what will come. Remember, there are no athiests in foxholes.

John B. { }

cultist {drow@pagan.net}

No one. I slept through the election.

Taylor {tayls@netwizards.net}

Allen Murray {allen@denalisites.com}