Sean, It's just politics. The major parties feel that they have to appeal to the "mushy middle" during the race in order to be elected. So during election time it might feel as if the two major (and the only viable--sorry) parties are grossly similar. But don't let that fool you--they are very different. I won't go into a looooong post. because I don't want to write it right now, and you don't probably want to read it :-), but what I do is try to think about WHO the 2 parties want to protect, and I keep coming back to the R's want to protect the wealthy, and the D's want to protect everybody else. Add that to potential Supreme Court nominations, and I know who I am voting for.

As an aside, I went down to the protest area yesterday, and I have to say that in general, things were quite calm until the protesters were surrounded and not allowed into the "pit"--the caged off protest area right next to Staples. I went merely to observe history, and I am predisposed to believe that almost all police officers are good people doing a difficult job. That being said, some of the tactical decisions made were not what I would have done--why keep the protestors FROM THE DESIGNATED PROTEST AREA? Some protesters were just looking for a fight, some were not, but keeping them from that area was kinda dumd, in my opinion, and gave them something to be angry about. Some of the protesters were actually ***alert*** not child friendly**** pissing in bottles, supposedly to throw at the police. Now, just how rude is that? At a rally to protest brutality it seems to me that the protestors would be better off by behaving in a manner that is beyond reproach. Just my opinion...