After National Gadfly's good diary, I want to post a gentle rejoinder.  I certainly have had similar thoughts in my life, however I just finished grading some philosophy exams.

Here are some highlights from my exams.  Keep in mind, names and characteristics have been omitted and students accept that their answers can be samples, so I am ethical with respect to FERPA and ethical obligations.

Here is one student writing about Sartre's famous statement "The work of art is an unreality"

What Sartre means by the 'intentional act that apprehends it',is that you aren't supposed to look at the physical properties of the painting but the bigger picture.  If a chip of paint came off you wouldn't think to yourself that this was the hand.  You would hopefully realize that it is just the physical aspect of the picture yet it is not the actual object.  This is sometimes difficult to do, but you can accomplish it when you are in the right frame of mind.

I have several stories to relate as to why I'm going to be participating in the upcoming Conservative thumping that's about to occur.  

It all starts back in 1992, I was a good little communist and I would kick all the appropriate people in the shins.  If you had Bush 41 bumper sticker, your shins were going to be sore.  I was even president of the local anti-American society at my high school: "The Society of Pointy Heads".

My first reason for not voting for the redistributionist is that I was watching a Clinton speech in 1992 when all of a sudden I laid down on the floor.  Then out of the blue, my little 5 pound poodle comes up behind and starts pulling my hair with his vicious doggy teeth.  That little five pound ball of terror would make my life miserable.  It also happens that little mfer would always wag his fluffy doggy tail whenever then Gov. Clinton would speak.  So clearly since all 5 pound dogs support Democrats, I knew at that moment, I had to become a Republican.  I stayed in denial until the second slight.

Hey all,

I want to understand the voting patterns just to see where the power dynamics and the fault lines lie.  This is meant as an honest inquiry, I have hypotheses but I don't wish to share them because it would effect the responses of the poll.  This is a very complex poll so the responses are going to have to be in the comments.  If any of this is too personal please don't answer and this poll will go away very quickly.  I think this will be helpful because it will be the first step to moving out of the anecdotal phase.  Please don't flame the responses, I will hide rate any flames and I encourage everyone else to as well.  Short clinical answers are best so I can tabulate results.  I encourage everyone to participate so there is as little of a selection bias as possible.  I apologize in advance if any etiquette or protocol was breached and I will remove upon official request with apologies.

Please answer the following questions if you choose to participate: