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05/03/2004 Entry: "More on presidents... and the parties they hold" I have lived through several presidents from Johnson to W. Bush. My first memory of any president was Nixon resigning. My parents hated him. I recall the following years where people were wearing T-shirts that said, "Don't buy books from crooks" when Nixon wrote his memoirs. Ford was kind of a bumbling old man, and lost to Carter, who, while too smart for the job, went on to become the greatest ex-president we have ever had, IMHO. Then Reagan got into office, and I never trusted him. He lasted eight years, and his wimpy VP followed him, and took us to Iraq for the first time. Then he lost to Clinton, and I kind of liked Clinton. I mean, he had some serious truth issues, but I didn't vote for him for his sex life. He did okay, in spite of everything. I didn't vote for Bush II, and was fairly sore he won. I didn't think Al Gore was a winner, either. I thought Al would be like Carter, and be too intellectual for the job. I am a registered Democrat, but that doesn't mean much because I don't always vote for party. I voted for Perot, for instance (it seemed a good idea at the time). I kind of feel like the old saying, "No matter who you vote for, the government always gets elected." But I vote anyway, under the "selective breeding" approach. I can't stand Republicans and a majority of their members (although Senator McCain is pretty cool). They are often rich, old, fat cats who don't give a crap about "commoners" like myself. I think the only policy I like of theirs is lax gun control. I am wary of Democrats as well, because it seems a lot of sex scandals happen with them (Kennedy, Clinton, etc...). They also want to ban guns, a right which even though I don't exercise, I fully support the right for all US Citizens to own a gun if they want to. You never know when the government will rise up against you, and Thomas Jefferson knew this, which is probably a big reason why it's in the Constitution. Also, my father was a staunch Democrat, and he was such a jerk, it will always be a caveat for all political parties for the rest of my life. My father acts very Republican, in the fact he's rich, hates people, works in defense contracting, and is in politics for his own gain. But no, if you ever used that word in front of him, he'll give you the smackdown. I can sum up both parties by a recent thing that happened to my son. CR was taking the tour of his future high school, and they had various clubs with tables, trying to get future freshmen to join. One of the flyers he got was from the "Young Democrats." "They had a popular table, man," he said. "They had a lot of people there, giving out candy." He also mentioned the Young Republicans table. "They only had one guy, and they weren't giving out anything, so no one went there." That's the main difference. I told him, "Democrats love to take your money, and give it out to the people who don't work. Republicans love to take your money..." [comedic sudden end]