Even cowboy supporters get the blues...

So what's got me feeling so blue? Surprisingly, it's the election results.

If you've been following along, you know that I am a strong Bush supporter. You know that even though I didn't think much of Bush in 2000, I've been hugely impressed with him since. You also know that I consider Kerry a bad presidential candidate—maybe the worst to run in my lifetime. The choice for president has never been so clear to me, the differences so stark.

But the polls have been close over the last couple of months, so I spent the week leading up to the election preparing myself for a Kerry win. I felt pretty confident of a Bush victory—in fact I predicted one, and not out of hope either. Still, I also knew how disappointed I would be if he lost, so I started steeling myself against the prospect of President Kerry.

I did a pretty fair job of it too. I really think that, had Kerry won, I would have been okay. It would have stung, but I would have accepted it. I would have come to think of him as "my president." I would have rallied behind him and hoped he performed quite a lot better than I had reason to believe he would.

What I didn't prepare for, what I had no inkling of, was the raw sock in the gut I felt following a Bush victory. OOF!

I'm very relieved that Bush won. I'm equally relieved that Kerry lost. But I just can't feel any elation over the result, because for the life of me I can't fathom why this election was anywhere near close. I'm not interested in re-living the entire campaign here. That's not the point. It's just that the choices here were so damn clear to me.

And the thing is, it's not like I'm some partisan hack. I honestly can't remember the last time I even voted. No candidate has impressed me since Reagan, and so I've just stayed out of it all these years. But this year was different. Even to someone as apolitical as me, the issues were crystal clear, the contrast between the candidates enormous. I did my homework this time. I studied the issues. I took a good look at the candidates. And the more I looked, the more convinced I became that the only responsible vote was for Bush. It just wasn't close.

So I’m not dealing well with the thought that nearly half the country didn’t get it—and further, that most of them are thinking I’m the one who doesn’t get it. Many of them are out there calling me and other Bush supporters rednecks, idiots, religious nuts, and worse. I know some of these people, and I have to say that they are not clear thinking, reasonable people. Many of them are downright nasty. So despite the comfort of knowing that “my guy” won, it scares me to realize that things easily could have turned out differently. It scares the hell out of me, in fact.

And it depresses me.