Dear Marion,

This thought just in: It's not a close call you say, that good Germans
should have voted early and often to frustrate Hitler; but you say
there is no comparable compelling urgency in this November's election
to keep the Tea Party Maniacs out of office. Are you sure?  Can you be
sure? Far from advocating that any one break election laws, I ask you,
aren't you kidding yourself when you say this election isn't really
that important. After all, Bush v. Gore gave us Nov. 11, Iraq,
Afghanistan, Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, - what more do you need to
consider an election vital? The folks banging on the door this November
want to abolish Social Security, Medicare, are ready to nuclear bomb
Iran, and blow up any one else they don't like. I'm not suggesting
that _You_ should vote early and often, but as a specialist in
situational ethics, don't you entertain the possibility that after
the nuclear war the Tea Party Celebrants start, you might think twice,
if you're still around to think at all, to argue that in this coming
election good Americans unlike good Germans in 1936, were not ethically
obliged to vote early and to vote often? How can you, where can you
draw a line?

Jochen