I voted last week.You probably know who for.
One of the votes I cast was on the ballot measure to reword the Iowa constitution to a more politically correct statement. Currently, the language that describes a person who cannot legally vote is an “idiot or insane person.” There is an individual who has working for many years from that understandably harsh statement to “a person adjudged mentally incompetent to vote.” Changing the constitution is a lengthy process, and if the measure passes, it will take two consecutive legislative sessions before the wording changes.
I actually voted to keep the wording. I like the idea of politically incorrect wording from a bygone era (as long as it doesn’t make us look racist or stupid) and this wording suits me just fine. Plus there’s a bit of juvenilia in my decision too.
People may think that I vote straight ticket during elections, but I don’t. I feel that the process seems more blind faith when I do, so I take every candidate into consideration. There may be elections where I vote for all of the candidates in one political party, but I’ll mark each one individually because of those aforementioned feelings.
Admittedly, there are probably a handful of times in which I voted for a Republican candidate. I’ve voted for Grassley a few times and then endured my father’s complaints after the fact. The funny thing is, when Grassley helped him out with something later on with a bill he was trying to get support on, my Dad thought he was just awesome. I also casted a few ballots for Jim Leach during the day. That is until the Republican Party strong-armed him into the entire Clinton Whitewater investigation, and then I realized that he was just a sap for the party line.
The irony here is that the Republicans later threw Leach under the bus in the last election and he was (finally) defeated by Dave Loebsack. Now Leach, in an apparent “Fuck you too” to his old party, has leant his support to Barack Obama. At first, I thought that maybe he was getting back into the groove to run again, showing us that he really was “independent,” but now I think that he’s cozy in his new life at Princeton. For those of you who don’t follow Iowa politics, Leach dug an early grave with the Republicans by not allowing the R.N.C. to distribute anti-gay political mailings to taint his opponent. Social conservatives pulled the plug on his 18th run towards the House and Loebsack, an unknown who was essentially a write-in candidate for the Democratic ticket, pulled a stunning upset.
It was kind of a big deal in my area of Iowa.
There was also that time where I voted for Nader in ’96, a ridiculous attempt at lofting a “protest” vote to the Democratic party because I felt the lines between Democrat and Republican were getting too blurred.. Since Nader is obviously such an egotistical weirdo…as evidenced by his obvious glee with being the 2000 spoiler…I’m now embarrassed by my decision to support such a fuck stick.
There seems to be a pretty obvious line with this election, one in which I can’t fathom why anyone would even be on the fence. Humorist David Sedaris speaks to this recently in the New Yorker. Sedaris questions how anyone could be an undecided voter at this stage of the game.
“Then you’ll see this man or woman— someone, I always think, who looks veryIndeed.
happy to be on TV. “Well, Charlie,” they say, “I’ve gone back and forth on the
issues and whatnot, but I just can’t seem to make up my mind!” Some insist that
there’s very little difference between candidate A and candidate B. Others claim
that they’re with A on defense and health care but are leaning toward B when it
comes to the economy.
I look at these people and can’t quite believe that
they exist. Are they professional actors? I wonder. Or are they simply laymen
who want a lot of attention?
To put them in perspective, I think of being on
an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and,
eventually, parks it beside my seat. “Can I interest you in the chicken?” she
asks. “Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?”
To be undecided in this election is to pause for a moment and then ask how
the chicken is cooked.
I mean, really, what’s to be confused about?”
The argument could be made that one could question how anyone could be a supporter of John McCain, but to each his own even when they are inherently insane when it comes to politics.
And as the Iowa constitution currently states, those people aren’t even allowed to vote in the first place.
3 comments:
Thanks for the comment and nice blog. I don't intend to change your mind and I may be throwing fuel on the fire, but thems a lot of word, time and energy when all three could have been put to good use at the beginning of the campaign. This is a fairly typical response from me, but one where I think that the majority of people who dislike their respective party's candidate have many opportunities to place a voice early on in the process to change who ultimately is nominated. I repeat this because I've seen it happen..most notably in this election with Obama.
There is an absolute truth that if you can find people with similar ideologies you can band together and shape the direction of a political party and, to a lesser but still viable degree, the election itself. If you're unable to do so, then one is forced to align themselves with a candidate that, at the very least, aligns them as closely as they can with their own ideology.
If I gather your last post correctly, that is where the problem starts. You've done the hard task of putting the positives and negatives of each candidate up and found them to be so similar that you're still "undecided" or, as you prefer, still "open." I appreciate your desire to identify yourself as "open" and you feel both candidates are qualified to lead, but I believe that the term "undecided" is a better fit for most as they haven't reached a similar conclusion and are at a point...incorrectly, I think...that they're forced to vote for the lesser of two evils.
So while I can appreciate your desire to want to be viewed with a correct label and would like to demonstrate the logic in how you can still be an open candidate, I can't understand how anyone would be able to view McCain as a legitimate contender. This feeling...one that, again, I don't expect you to share or realize...is based on considering the realities of his age, behavior, voting record, and history. But the ultimate decision is this: the entire notion of McCain as a "maverick" is shortsighted, particularly when you look at John McCain after he lost the 2000 primary. For the past 8 years, he's completely aligned himself with the right (pun intended) Republican power brokers in order to get to the point where he's at now. The irony with that is that his nomination came from very unconventional methods and with supporters that promoted his unconventional campaign. And now that he is the nominee, he let go those loyal supporters and shored up a team of behind the scenes people that mirror the same people he's telling us that he's stood up against. Not only does this make him a liar, it's unraveling his campaign and will be his fucking undoing comes November 4th.
And for me, I firmly believe that the only way that this man will be elected is because race becomes the final reason that anyone decides to pull the McCain level on election day.
I also do not vote a straight party ticket. It just doesn't seem responsible to me. I don't understand how a person could have this tremendous privilege/opportunity and then not examine the candidate or situation individually. For example, when we lived in Peoria there was a long serving U.S Representative from the opposite party that I would normally vote for but this guy is generally very good for the local community as well as the state so he got my votes. The sad part is that I know people, and you probably do too, who are going to vote straight party ticket. And it's not just that they are ideologically opposites of my thinking its that they vote for reasons that I have a very hard time understanding. I think that social issues are brought up in elections to distract people from the real issue, $$$. I mean, these people I know make probably $60,000 a year, vote Republican, and expect to benefit from the economic policies. Do they even understand the party that they are voting for? Black Ice rules!
I'll probably vote straight ticket, but that's just because I've been hypnotized.
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