Bush Versus Kerry

Ever since hearing Yaron Brook's talk The Morality of War a few weeks ago, I've been slowly overcoming my substantial revulsion to voting for Kerry. Of course, Kerry is uniformly awful -- although his election would likely create some blessed gridlock in Washington and perhaps even arouse some thoughts of fiscal conservatism by Republicans. Yet Bush's altruistic imperialism concealed by a veneer of tough talk in the War on Terror seems deeply dangerous, in that it discredits the "hawk" position as impractical ineffective.

However, some recent concerns raised by Paul, particularly in combination with similar arguments by Harry Binswanger, have once again placed me on the fence. In particular, the (almost) complete dominance of the universities by the left ought to indicate that the nihilism, altruism, and collectivism of the left is very much alive, if not well. That worries me, even though I regard religion as the more powerful and dangerous force in the long run. And perhaps that religion is best combated directly at this point, i.e. with the Bush administration in power. If Kerry is elected, I fear a worse situation in which the newly mobilized religious opposition paints itself as the only alternative to the surrendering subjectivism of the left. Then again, if Bush is elected, appeasement and UN-style multilateralism will be presented as the only alternative to his failed policies in the War on Terror.

Oy. It's bad all around, I think.