Oh, how things change in 4 years

[Zergling]

It is interesting to read about people's current views of the upcoming election and compare them to what people would have said several years ago. some examples:

Four years or more ago McCain would have been assumed to be unable to win candidacy thanks to lack of religious right support.

Several years ago, more liberalish types would have been cheering to here that McCain was the republican candidate, as opposed to now just being an Iraq war continuer. (Though given how opinions shift around it does seem that problems would have surfaced pretty quickly.)

Republicans were assumed to be unstoppable, now they seem to be in a much weaker position.

Obama was seen as an unlikely presidential candidate, thanks to just having become a senator.

For a bit of gloating, I had mentally made a note to myself that some of these changes would be occuring (McCain being a competetive candidate, Republicans getting weaker.), though a lot of changes nowadays I would have missed by a mile.

 

[ygolo]

It has been quite a change.

I consider myself centrist, and have voted for third parties for a while.

I now find myself supporting Obama, despite disagreeing with his politics (that speech on race did much of the convincing).

He seems inclined to talk about issues in a reasonable way(not focus-group-based, not dogmatic), and can be as charismatic a leader as the U.S. has had in a long while.