November 1, 2008
thoughts before the election
1.
The failures of the last eight years are not a peculiarity of Bush; they are a failure of Republican ideology. When you stitch a party together from anti-intellectual Christianism and tax cuts for the rich, this is what you get.
2.
The repudiation of McCain-Palin isn’t simply a repudiation of George Bush, it’s a repudiation of Ronald Reagan.
3.
This is the easiest election you’ll have the luxury of being involved with. If you like the way the last eight years have gone, vote for John McCain. If you want to undermine the chances of the best candidate being elected, vote for a third party. After the last eight years, it’s as simple as that. 2004 was the last time anyone had the luxury of thinking otherwise.
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Deron! These dumb elections in this dumb country are more complicated than that. I’m (perhaps famously around these parts) voting for a third (or second, if you ask me) party candidate. But I’m doing so from the comfort of Connecticut. And that’s a major factor in my decision-making process. Obama’s got a twenty-five point lead here (as of October 22, the last time anybody bothered to poll us Connecticutters).
My vote will have no effect at all on Obama’s (nor McPalin’s) chances. But it might have some effect on the seriousness with which third-party candidacies are made and received in the future, which I would argue is another factor for voters to consider in the non-battleground states.
I understand your reasoning, Jonathan, it makes sense to me.
I have this theory that the best bet for a viable third party wouldn’t be further left of the Dems (Nader) or right of the Repubs (Paul), but an Evangelical Christianist Party, built on socially conservative Biblical principals alone. Let those voters who feel obligated to vote for “God’s party” do so without being yoked into supporting big or small government in the process, and let Progressives and fiscal conservatives get out of the business of speaking religious code to win votes. I doubt the party could win the Presidency, but they could put together a comfortable minority in Congress which could form coalitions with the big two (or abstain) depending on the bill at hand. I don’t think religion can ever be separated from politics, so why not give it its own voice.
Thank you, Deron.
Jonathan, I voted for Nader in 2000 for the same reasons you state above–my vote for Gore would have counted for nothing in Texas, so I participated in the “vote swap” plan where progressives in swing states pledged to vote for Gore in exchange for progressives in non-swing states voting for Nader. We hoped to make a statement.
But nobody expected the outcome of that election, with Gore winning the national popular vote (and probably the election itself). Had all of Nader’s votes gone to Gore–especially in Florida–we would have seen a different outcome, and we’d be living in a different country today.
The fact is that a lot of people have devoted their lives to bringing viable third-party candidates into play. Perhaps you are too young to remember Ross Perot (whose successful third party candidacy, by the way, likely resulted in Clinton’s election over Bush).
You’re right that your third party vote will send a message, but I don’t think it will necessarily be the message you hope to send. Your vote will represent a vote against Obama to conservatives, who will be looking for every justification they can find to repudiate him.
This election is a watershed event. Every vote for Obama is a stand. If my support for him in Texas means nothing in terms of electoral votes, so be it. My vote for Barack Obama will serve as one more voice in the chorus, cheering him and thanking him for the hope he has restored to us.
Who were the people in 2004 who had the luxury of thinking otherwise?
That was the first time I ever voted in my life, and I’ve been eligible since before the ’84 election.
brachinus, I was being generous.
Cindy, thanks for that, but I’m certainly not too young to remember Perot. My first (voting-age) election included his second candidacy. And it (1996) was the fourth presidential election that I wanted to be able to vote in, that I had strong opinions about and such.
And yes, I had an opinion about the 1984 election, when I was six. We actually had a vote at my school (which consisted of first, second, and third graders). Mondale won in a landslide. ‘Tis one of the reasons I think there should be more of a children’s suffrage movement in this country.
I think I feel some of what you feel about this election. I honestly wish I could place two votes on Tuesday. Which I guess is why I’m volunteering for Obama on Monday and Tuesday. I’ve gone politically schizophrenic. Which I think might actually be a reasonable reaction to all of this.
To get off the third-party subject, though, some thoughts on Deron’s other points:
1. True story. How anti-intellectualism could ever have cultivated enough adherents to become an ism, I’ll never understand.
2. Great, great point, and I wish more people were making it. How this all is not being more clearly related to Reaganism, I’ll also never understand.
3. One thing about McCain: Those of us who expect President Obama to be the same shining light of progressivism that Democratic candidate Obama seemed to possibly be in the primaries and before should probably also expect President McCain to be the same genuinely moderate, relatively thoughtful McCain of his pre-2008 election cycle Senatorhood.
Or, put another way: If this election were between George W. Bush and John McCain (and no one else at all), I’d—well, I’d blow my head off. But after that, I’d vote for McCain in a heartbeat.
The problem with that, of course is, well, heartbeats. And the whole thing where there’s a fair chance that Senator McCain doesn’t have four years’ worth of them left. And a Palin presidency frightens me even more than a third Bush term would.
Which is utterly shocking to my sensibilities.
Jonathan, make your statement if you must. It will not resonate far.
Mike D, well said. The E. C. Republicans have given fiscal conservatism a bad name. They need their own party because they are a party (political movement) unto themselves.
However true that is, it’s just as true about any individual vote in an election of this size.
And it’s a shitty way to look at the world.
You are cutie, Jonathan. Guess I’ve had more time to observe and think about these shitty things.
Why vote for the lesser evil? Cthulhu ’08!
Not to pick on Brachinus, but every time I hear about someone who’s skipped voting in years’ worth of elections, I want to hit him or her upside the head with a two-by-four. I recently found out, for instance, that one of my mother’s former students, who is my venerable age and an NYC/New Jersey public schoolteacher, for fuck’s sake, has never voted, and has told his students so. “Don’t do as I do,” he told them. Yeah, right. This, from a guy who’s actually the rare kind of teacher whom kids admire and think is cool.
MAJOR FAIL.
I hope I’m preaching to the converted here, but this is, in essence, what I said to that fucking idiot, whom I otherwise think highly of: Okay, so maybe you don’t care for either of the candidates who’s up for being president. But do you understand how people get into that position?
In order to get to have the honor of having millions of people consider whether you could be president without fucking things up too much, you usually have to have been elected to some position below that—say, senator or governor—first. And to get to that position, you have to have been elected to some less glamorous one under it, like state assembly member, state attorney general, or mayor of a big city (or, as the case may be, mayor of a sub-truckstop speck on the map, somewhere to the right of the middle of fucking nowhere). And before that, you probably had to have some string of piddly local positions, like city council member.
You may not find it exciting, but that’s the way this big, lumpy country works: it’s very rare for someone to rise to the top of the heap from nowhere, because it takes a staggering amount of money to buy the kind of recognition and support you get from clambering up all those lower stages (which are, in themselves, expensive to reach). So if you don’t think any of the presidential candidates are worth your time but want to see better options a few years down the line, fine, don’t vote for a presidential candidate. But still, get your ass to the fucking polls, and vote for the little people. And especially vote in primaries, if you’re eligible.
Because that is where all these shitty choices come from: decades of irresponsible citizens like you not making it clear what kind of candidates you do want. Voting is how you do that, in this country. Most of the alternative methods involve guns and leave even more people dissatisfied, which is not desirable. And you don’t get to vote very often, so make sure you don’t miss any opportunities.
Furthermore, in between elections, send letters to your elected representatives, whether you elected them or not. On paper. With a stamp. To quote Clay Shirky in Here Comes Everybody (which I recommend),
And don’t just send letters of complaint. If you are so lucky as to have a representative who actually seems principled and sensible, and who doesn’t vote for evil shit all the time, write a letter thanking him or her and listing the behaviors you approve of. Because by the time the next election rolls around, it may be too late to make your wishes about the direction of your government known.
So. After you’ve done those things, then you get to bitch about the quality of the candidates in a given election. Not before. Every time you don’t vote, you’re letting other dumbfucks vote for you—not just for today, but for every election down the line, in your lifetime.
Moron.
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Your key point is that this is indeed an indictment of the ideology flowing from the Reagan era. He (Reagan) was charismatic enough to make it seem that the ideological emperor had clothes. His protege in the current administration has lost what charisma he was able to paste on at the beginning of his reign, but it has all disappeared–and not only the man, but the ideology is exposed as a naked redistribution of wealth for the elite at the expense of the “man (sic) in the middle.” It wasn’t socialism (that’s for sure), but a kind of economic monarchy bought and paid for by all of its diminished but adoring fans who are, it seems, perhaps awakening from this long drawn-out nightmare.
Lynn–yes, well said my friend. I have long thought that the Republican Party has done a fine job of understanding the mythic power of wealth–the easy narrative it affords of a ladder made of mere steps. This has tended to elicit in the ambitious poor the false sense of being on the right “team.” And it is only after years of not making much headway that the con begins to become apparent to those who are bright enough to recognize such a limit–such a locked gate at mid-stairway.
Greetings, Daryl… I am not sure why people vote against their own interests, but you may have “cracked the code” to that mystery. I have felt for years that Republican and Conservative ideology blinded people by throwing dust in the air and calling it normal atmosphere, but your sense of an inward ambition toward wealth makes so much sense. People want to believe that they can “make it” in some kind of opulence–and the ideology told them that it could if they would only follow the secure pathway and the elite rich into the kingdom of wealth–of course the ticket was to give away more of the wealth they had–ah, the conundrum. Tomorrow ought to be interesting.