Unfathomable Juggernaut of Patriotic Destiny

The election is nigh. The stars are aligned. The maniacs are out in full force, boots stomping and signs waving. Soon it will all be over. Soon, my beloved, we shall rest peacefully.
The chaotic zoo of the 2008 presidential election will be cast in stone and etched in history in a few days. Everything we've heard, from the idiot talking head pundits to the partisan toadies to the polished candidates themselves and bullshit rhetoric will all be a memory. The seething and venom and frothing at the mouth will be replaced by a concrete reality - one where a candidate and a mandate will shape the destiny of the country for the next four years. All the dumb comedy bits, burned-out hippie terrorists and Joe the Plumbers won't change shit.
The nation would have crossed its Rubicon and cast its lot with either John McCain or Barack Obama.
And for the foreseeable future, America will still endure.
Because, boys and girls, nothing that's happened in this election really matters. What matters is what will happen after Nov. 4. The rancor and insults at Sarah Palin rallies, the hucksterism of Obama, the lunacy of McCain during the debates is only prologue. Now descends the time of decision, a time when the voters invest in the country's future.
The online tirades, e-mails and doomsday scenarios if either Obama or McCain are elected are just parlor game, childish pastimes forged by the hysterical and indignant.
And the slogans - those blessed wonderful slogans - from "Drill Baby, Drill" to "Yes We Can" to the universally accepted mantra both camps are chanting now: "Change".
The accusations - that Obama is a terrorist, that he pals around with terrorists, that he's a socialist, a communist, a Muslim, un-American and foreign - and that McCain has a violent temper, is an adulterer, is as old as Methuselah and is as crazy as a shithouse rat.
And punditry, taken to new levels of shame and histrionics: the dramatic hissy fit Keith Olbermann had after the creepy fear-laced video about 9/11 shown at the Republican National Convention and testy Sean Hannity crucifying Obama and Palin not being able to name a single newspaper she reads. All of it theater - dramatic, insane and meaningless.
The media proved it is the Democrat's bitch on a leash, with more negative news skewing towards McCain than Obama. Did the mainstream media fear it might get the boot from Obama's airplane? Is this bias the reason why McCain didn't grant many interviews? Could the media have covered the election better, with more focus on the issues instead of personalities?
The vengeful attack ads, the psychopathic partisans, the flame wars online. Tina Fey's Palin impersonation, a prank call with Montreal disc jockeys and Obama dancing on Oprah. Politics transcended the realm of stoic lawmakers and entered popular culture and mass consumption. Now they become the idiots on the idiot box, singing and dancing for public attention. In the age of cable TV and 24-hour news cycles, it's the current way to campaign.
But all of this will be trivial after the election.
Because after Nov. 4, we enter another phase before Inauguration Day - the blame game, the Monday morning quarterbacking and the woulda-coulda-shouldas.
And so it has come to pass. The voters will set the tone.