Old Decathlon Olympics Journal

Oct. 1 - Let the Games Begin

October 1st, 2004

I watched the Presidential debate tonight with great interest, and truly did not have a predetermined outcome ingrained in my mind. I wanted to see these two men address the issues side by side. President George W. Bush has scared me for a very long time, but I have not had much of an opportunity to hear much from Senator John Kerry. I have grown very weary of hearing from their spokesmen, so I saw this first of the three scheduled debates as an opportunity to see the men in action, not tethered to their political handlers.

In my humble opinion, President Bush demonstrated his arrogance by not seeming to be comfortable with being questioned about his actions and positions on the situation in Iraq. Bush continually repeated himself, and he sounded unprepared for this debate. I truly believe that Bush is a man who thinks Americans need a King. I do not say this lightly, and I do not intend it to be just another ugly slur. For a long time now I have felt that George W. Bush has lost touch with the American people. He has forgotten what the true definition of the word DEMOCRACY is.

I think that there are a great number of people that serve in the Bush administration that are also misinformed about DEMOCRACY, none more than Bush, but misinformed just the same. I have the feeling that THE PEOPLE matter less and less to the current administration. I am so impressed with Senator John Kerry’s presentation of himself tonight. I had no idea of what to expect, so I was very pleasantly surprised. Bush did exactly what I expected him to do – MORE OF THE SAME. So, if I had to call the ball, I would gladly say that Kerry scored this round.

NOW, ABOUT OLYMPIC DECATHLON 2004

I am so excited about being in the Olympic Decathlon this year; especially after all of the confusion I had last year. I also don’t foresee having any of the traumatic personal problems that I faced last year. I have some reservations about some of the up coming events, but that is mostly because I truly did not enjoy the Scavenger Hunt last year. It was too easy to cheat. Everybody’s answers were posted directly into the forum, and after the first couple of entries were posted I could have compiled a complete list with all the correct answers, but that would have been CHEATING. I don’t cheat, and I saw no point in continuing. I am not saying anybody else did compile their answers from other Olympian’s entries in the Scavenger Hunt, but even the Milkman has mentioned that some people tried to get ahead by finding out about the various contests in advance.

I know that I like the Campfire idea. It will be interesting, and I believe that the most difficult part will be NOT going over the word limit. I can appreciate the need for a word limit, too, since we can be a gabby bunch of people. So far so good, but of course I really did think that there were thirty-one days in September, too. So God only knows what can happen from now till the end of October.