Reading notes

Yes! The Charlotte, NC pumpkin wall symbolizes this for me: The ghoulish warmongering and monster-ous injustice of the Bush Doctrine will not triumph; its (rotten) center cannot hold. (See the “No War” above the first R, and “Vote” above the Y?)

This pumpkin-wall photo leads off this article about the huge Kerry rallies that have been happening across the country.

Orlando, Fla., Oct. 30 — Bruce Springsteen is a hard act to follow, and Senator John Kerry was not born to perform. But the huge, high-voltage crowds who gathered this week to cheer on the Democratic presidential candidate did not care about his skill as a performer. At back-to-back rallies across the battleground states, on leaf-dusted streets and college lawns, at civic arenas and bayfront amphitheaters, Mr. Kerry’s supporters packed away any concerns they once had about his charisma. They were galvanized, they said, by his ideas. …

In defiance of the idea that this is an era of personality politics, where style trumps substance, Mr. Kerry was drawing hundreds of thousands to rallies by what they saw as the strength of his political positions.

Hundreds of thousands. Crowds as far as the eye can see. No loyalty oaths. No pledge of allegiance to the president. Or any other kind of idolatrous bullshit. Just real old-fashioned campaign rallies talkin’ sense about things that matter.