The U.S. presidency is like a box of chocolates

If Bush and Kerry partisans can agree on anything, it's that the stakes on Election Day couldn't be any higher. "The most important election of our lifetime," both parties intone. Like most pieces of conventional wisdom, this oft-repeated shibboleth leaves plenty of room for doubt.

One of the hidden strengths of the American electoral system is that it rarely presents voters with a very stark choice. Both parties hew closely to the center, and, notwithstanding pre-election bloviation, there is always a great deal of continuity between administrations. The falsity of most campaign rhetoric becomes obvious if you consider two of the most acrimonious elections of the 20th century.

In 1964, Lyndon Johnson painted Barry Goldwater as a nutty warmonger. In 1972, Richard Nixon painted George McGovern as a soft-on-communism peacenik. Yet what happened after the vote? Johnson became ever more embroiled in bombing Vietnam back to the stone age, while Nixon exited the war by cutting a deal with the communist regime in Hanoi. It's hard to know, in retrospect, what all the fuss was about.

The choice this time is even less clear-cut. Both President Bush and Sen. John F. Kerry claim to be fiscal conservatives, yet each proposes a plethora of new programs. Bush is more likely than Kerry to press for partial privatization of Social Security, while Kerry is more likely to press for partial federalization of health care. Odds are that neither man will get all he wants out of a Congress that will remain deeply divided.

There's even less chance either candidate would make a major difference on social issues such as abortion and gay marriage. Significant change will require a constitutional amendment or a radical recasting of the Supreme Court, neither of which would be easy to accomplish, no matter who occupies the Oval Office.

What about national security? If you listen to Bush, Kerry's election would result in nuclear annihilation. If you listen to Kerry, Bush's election would result in another draft. The reality is that, no matter who's elected, a nuclear attack could happen and a draft won't happen.