So the election is in two weeks. I can't decide whether to hope for a tight race, a landslide, or more October surprises between now and then. Having voted a week ago for neither major party candidate, I find myself deprived of much interest beyond that which is only meta- in nature.
A tight race makes for a fun election night, but not if it goes beyond the next morning. If it takes days or weeks for a final decision, we're going to deal with all the accusations from both sides that our voting process was fixed and therefore illegitimate, which will be a mess to sort out and not good for the country.
If we have a landslide on either side, the cries of an illegitimate election will not be as loud (though I anticipate they would still be there), but the antagonism and arrogance of the winning party will surely be unbearable. We're almost assured that neither party is going to lose graciously, but because of the crassness of the campaigns and those involved in them, we can be equally assured that neither party will win graciously, either. This will also not be good for the country.
With no more than two weeks left, the hope that something will come out that would make obvious the need to disqualify either candidate seems fleeting. It's not like we haven't had possibilities (both candidates' performance at the first debate; Trump's inscrutable tax situation and increasingly belligerent behavior; Biden's mental stability and questionable involvement with son Hunter's business relations), but short of blood-on-the-hands murder or burning-of-the-flag treason, I fear the American public has become too numb as an electorate to cast a vote against their preferred candidate simply out of fear of the other guy. This also is not good for the country.
Because of what our election process has become, the leaders it produces as a result, and our unwillingness to work to change any of it, we deserve the leaders we elect on November 3rd.
Unfortunately, regardless of who wins, America loses.