My sisters friend who recently graduated from his Doctorates in Engineering at the University of Florida sent her an email.

The email contained a letter his brother had written to Senator Kerry before the ballots were finished being counted, but I feel it was a very moving letter and would like to share it here.

(Names edited for Privacy)

November 3, 2004

Senator Kerry,

I It is 3:26am on Wednesday, November 3. I have just returned from Copley Square where myself and a crowd of others had to be told it was time to leave. The results appear bleak, and I admit, I am disheartened. Yet, I am not without hope.

I do not know if you will come out ahead, and perhaps I should have addressed you as President instead of Senator. It would be an honor for America and the world to have you serve this great nation as President. I have many questions about how the next few days will unfold, but there is nothing I can do for that fight now. Yet I am still not without hope.

I am 25 years old, and in my short time, having already owned and sold my own business, I have learned difficult lessons about who I am, and how firmly my principles must resist conflicting desires for personal gain. Tonight, I learned yet another lesson about my fellow countrymen and how their principles stack up against their desires for perceived personal gain. Yet, I am still not without hope.

The most important moment for me tonight was not watching the results which I could not effect but instead when I saw two groups of Bush supporters waving banners in Copley Square. Neither group was harassed. Both groups, with opinions vastly different from my own, were allowed to peacefully wave their banners in opposition. I watched them exercise their rights in the public gathering, and I watched them continue to display their opposition within the private gathering. I began to realize why I still have hope.

During your campaign, you made it clear that help is on the way. You understand that if every person truly understood your principles and how they are effected by your plans, there would be only blue states.

Unfortunately, many people do not understand your views, and the result makes me weep for the very people which vote against you, but I am still not without hope.

Senator Kerry, your unwavering devotion to your principles, principles founded on selfless beliefs, has inspired a generation of young people to get involved in government. If I am disheartened about voter misunderstanding, then it is my obligation to myself, to my country, and to the world, to get involved in educating people. You have inspired myself and countless others to get involved, and you were correct. Whether through your service as president or through ripples of inspiration, help is on the way.

Thank you for everything you have done for our country.

With great admiration,

Matthew (Edit)

...................

I found that letter rather moving and very well written. Also there is a really good article from the NY Times which I feel poses great questions. Here's the link if you would like to read that

Two Nations Under God:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/04/opinion/04friedman.html?hp


Laura

good letter

Good Letter, somewhat offensive to some i'd think. The idea that anyone who voted for Bush is simply a poor misguided soul who must be wept for isn't the best way forward.

My thoughts exactly. The letter gets an A for quality and writing skill, I must admit. However, as DeT said, it makes it out like people voting for Bush are just fools who need to be shown the light.

Oh I understand his views very well... he wants to be president, and would support any view that will get him there.

I don't like the letter, no matter how eloquent it is, maybe because I fail to see exactly what Kerry had ever done. I personally don't see him as a good person in any respect, and his actions, such as voting against the first Iraq war, his dereliction of duty when he was on the senate intelligence committee, voting for the second war when it was popular then against when he saw personal gain in it, as well as his actions regarding the Vietnam war, do not speak well of him at all. Please, enlighten me to the man's actual achievements. Not plans, but actions...

I say this because the letter says we didn't understand his ideas, we were misinformed, blah blah blah...

Bring up Bush in a refute to this post and you lose. This is about Kerry, not Bush. Concrete examples as well, not like "He helped the economy" but "He supported/proposed regulation XYZ that performed duties A, B, and C.

Well I don't like the content and agree with you on that Kuat, but I admit the letter itself was written well.

But I would like to see if the Kerry supporters can live up to your "challenge" and support him without bringing Bush into it.

I take the setiments of one DeTRiTiC-iQ

A couple of typos, but pretty eloquent. Didn't exactly blow me away, but strikes me as a very nice thing to recieve anyway.

Nice letter, but I tend to agree with the views expressed in the responses so far. The letter paints Kerry as a savior, or another FDR. He is not, and would not have been that.

There is a big grammatical error in the second sentence of the letter (using myself in that way, and referring to himself before referring to others).

It is definitely emotional, but I don't like the letter. It sounds like something someone would say in a prayer to Jesus-lamenting all of the lost souls who are going to burn in hell.

Plus there's a bit of a "I'm better than you" (you being Bush supporters) tone to it. Kerry was much more eloquent in his concession with his "We're all Americans" bit.

I've been wanting to ask this for a little while now, but none of the other threads was really appropriate. Note for the hyper-defensive: this is a question based from curiosity, not a criticism and I'm pretty sure I haven't worded it all that well.

Why are the americans so involved/passionate about their politics? I've been genuinely suprised by how fired up and emotional everyone gets over this whole thing. Do you guys get political classes all through school? Is it drilled into you like the land of the free/we all have rights/amendment stuff?

I was amazed at the report that people waited 5 hours to vote. Once again I'm just curious about it. In Aussieland, there is a general nationwide apathy about the whole political process. We do care, but we just don't get so worked about it. Could this be just because voting is compulsory down here?

I can't recall ever seeing anything like those massive rallies down this end of the world either. We have them, but to nowhere near the extent that they have in the US. America seems to idolise their politicians and it cracks me up to even think about that happening down here. There were a lot of people who were unhappy about little Johnnie getting re-elected but I don't remember anyone being that upset about it. Those who were unimpressed just seemed to take it on the chin and move on.

Wow, that turned out to be a lot lengthier than I planned and more of a ramble than I'd like. Any thoughts?

the daily star this morning had a headline saying "How can 59,000,000 people be so stupid?" or something to that effect... seemed like quite an ignorant statement, even for one of the knuckle draggers newspapers.

Because they say that whoever wins the Nations elections, wins the worlds elections. Until we as americans realize how unimportent we really are, we'll keep idolizing the businessman who sits in his white building and signs papers all day.

JediKirby

The country is fairly divided at the moment. The division betwen the two sides really drove the massive voter turnout and the political participation this time around. Plus, I think there are still some hard feelings from the 2000 election.

Well, I suupose it's a combination of things:

1.) Rooting for the "home team". Because we are republicans//democrats our "team" must "win".

2.) Things they do actually matter to us. For example many democrats ==> higher taxes. More Republicans ==> Less social programs

3.) Boredom. While this isn't everyone's case by far, I have a feeling people need something to do. This fills that aspect.

http://www.nielsbuus.dk/rod/2004election_by_iq.png

?

Bored? You can flip coins without an election, believe it or not!

Ooohhh...Statistics! He must be right!

As much as i like the fact that NJ is #3 on that list, you, sir, are an imbicile. I voted for bush and well, looky here. IQ 150+, depending on where i took th test. so, yeah. think before you insult a hell of alot of people.

[EDIT] I would like to make a general apology to the admins (specifically DS and MB), that last bit of my post was... well, lets just say it was in bad taste. I was very angry over that, but it won't happen again. [/sanity]

How did they get the average IQ of each state? Last I checked, people aren't administered mandatory IQ tests.

That's because they didn't get numbers. They took age-old misconceptions (notice that the midwest is towards the bottom of the chart, while the coastal states are at the top?), and stuck them on a pretty chart. Either that or they used a very, very flawed poll of some sort. I mean, just think for a second, do you honestly believe Mississippi has an average IQ of 85, while New Jersey has 111?

From the same "institute" that rated the presidents? (was in a link a while back)

Though the letter was technically good, it had one flaw. It was very vague and referred to things the writer no doubt feels very strongly, and who knows, Kerry could imagine what they are (or make good guesses), but still it should have been more compact and clear. Now it looks like the writer only feels but doesn't really know how to think clearly what he's saying. While politicians surely fish for votes and voters also based on emotional feelings and images, they are not in reality a good basis to make decisions, like choose who to vote for.



Some people with high intelligence are sociopaths, some are plainly arrogant. Choose your way, but choose it wisely.

Quick, someone make up a poll and chart showing that the states who voted Republican have a higher IQ then the states who voted Democrat, that way WE'LL have the advantage!

Done!

Texas: Eleventy-billion IQ points!
Anti-bush states: -50x10^645634546!

Ooooh, numbers! They must be correct!

That would be sociopath, thank you.