CBS

[Will]

It's a character thing. In the past, Bush has (alegedly, but few actually doubt it) abused position and power to get away with things other people couldn't. And (alegedly) brag about it. Fast forward thirty years later, and he's doing pretty much the same thing with the Presidency. So, we are led to conclude, if it has happened before in the past, and it has happened recently, it is then reasonably safe to assume that the same abuses (erosion of civil liberties, tying "terrorism" into anything and everything, unilateral pre-emptive invasion for dubious reasons at high cost to average citizens, almost no crackdowns on corporate scandals, the list goes on...) and bragging ("Mission Accomplished" photo-op on carrier, the circus that was made around the capture of Saddam and the invasion of Iraq as a whole, "We're fighting evil!", and so on) will continue to happen in the future. With just what's happened recently, there's still a strong arguement to vote someone else. By showing a pattern of the same behaviour, they hopefully lock in that arguement so as to be irrefutable except by those blinded by partisan dogma. Meaning those people that think that all that stuff Bush did is great (I know they exist, I've met some).

What actually seems to be happening is that people end up hating one candidate and merely disliking the other. Both candidates' attempts to lift up their own image is on shakey ground, too, so it doesn't look like the hate/dislike combo is going to change in 43 days. And in the absence of any viable alternative, most people are going to vote for dislike just so hate doesn't get in.