Journal: Nov. 9, 2000, Thursday

This is the end of the school week, for Friday is Veterans Day, a holiday. I will go to Charles Schwab tomorrow to reinvest my stocks into an index mutual fund. It is time to reevaluate my investments. the entire past year most of my stocks were down dramatically, especially Union Carbide and Caterpillar. In both of those, I had lost around a thousand each. Now they are going up so the loss is not as great, but there has been no gain. The presidential election has supposedly had an effect on the stockmarket in the past two days. Thee is a question about the returns in Florida, where the votes are being recounted. The entire voting system is terrible. Principally, the electoral college needs to be dispensed with, because it negates the popular vote. The popular vote should be the only one. Aside from that, the people are not fiven all the facts and are not given enough choices. There are only two candidates from two parties that are given the chance to debate on the public airways --- hte other candidates omitted -- so what are we allowed to hear? Only a limited choice of viewpoints. It is wrong to exclude the other candidates. All candidates should be heard. I voted rfor Ralph Nader, as the only one I feel has has integrity. He is a man who does not seem to seek personal aggrandizement or acclaim, and he has worked continually for the American consumer.