Tuesday, November 2, 2010

ELECTION DAY

Welcome to The Buddha Diaries on Election Day, 2010. I devoted much of my meditation time this morning to sending out metta--goodwill, along with the wish that all who vote in today's election will do so with wisdom, enlightened self interest, and compassion for themselves and their fellow Americans, as well as for all living beings with whom they share this planet. I believe that my personal true happiness and self-interest pre-suppose the fulfillment of the happiness and self-interest of my fellow beings, and that the one is not possible without the other. May we all vote wisely today.

A quick footnote to my post about the Rally to Restore Sanity. I made much of my belief that, for whatever reason, the media had vastly underestimated attendance. This Metrorail report suggests that I'm right. 825,437 people passed through the turnstiles on Saturday, compared with the normal 350,000. Your math skills are probably better than mine, so I leave you to draw your own conclusions. Mine is that the media reports were biased, minimized the event and, purposefully or not, completely misinterpreted its meaning.
Yesterday, woke with a horrible bad back. We enjoyed a leisurely breakfast and said our goodbyes to Marjorie and Damian, and headed back to downtown Washington on the Metro (amazingly, today, UNcrowded,) where we spent a few more hours at the National Gallery. Saw the American Modernism show, which we had missed on Sunday, and had a pleasant lunch in the restaurant below street level between the West and East Wings. Then headed for Union Station for the three-and-a-half hour train ride back to New York City. Dinner at a very civilized Italian restaurant across the street from where we're staying, and took advantage of a quiet evening to catch up and relax before bedtime.

Having voted early, and by mail, we have no civic duty today. We would have wanted to watch the election results this evening, but have no television. So we'll have to wait until tomorrow morning to find out what happened... Here's hoping the polls were as skewed as many people thought they were!

1 comment:

khengsiong said...

If I were an American voter, I think most likely I'll support Democrats this time. Republicans, and particularly those supported by Tea Party, are just too conservative.

OK, Arnold is moderate, but he is outgoing...