Teresa: Your assumption (and his) is that you know what is best for your neighbors, and have some superior understanding of what constitutes compassion towards them. I'm well aware of that philosophical tradition, and reject it for its exceptional arrogance. When you vote on this basis, you vote for your conception of his interests, which really isn't the same thing at all.
And since I apologized for using the term "undereducated" too loosely already, I can't imagine what you mean by going on about his qualifications to pronounce on political issues.
It's very difficult to see the distinction that all of you are making between you voting your conscience and me voting mine. Because that's exactly what you did, and I respect you for it. In fact, voting our mutual consciences led us to many of the same decisions regarding the national offices.
Stefan: And that is both the most sensible thing anyone has said here and the best news I've heard all day all at once.
Sorry, Teresa, but the notion that I vote on behalf of my neighbor is just silly. I don't think it requires the marshalling of statistics. My neighbors have very different priorities and needs.
I spoke far too loosely when I called that view "undereducated", because I don't know anything concrete about his (her?) education.
Lorax: Well, as a libertarianish type who voted for Gore in 2000, I held my nose perfectly well, thank you very much. In fact, I just cast my vote for Diane Feinstein, which required quite a bit more nose-plugging action. Nowhere did I say that it was wrong to vote for a major party candidate (although you and your friends seem perfectly willing to dictate to me when and how I should vote). I don't deny the concept of strategic voting, and I often vote for candidates I consider subpar because in a close election where one candidate would, you know, annihilate the Republic. My objection is the principle (and yes, for some people here it does seem to rise to the level of principle) that voting for a third party candidate in any race and in any context is wrong, because it "takes votes away" from someone else. Bullshit. Those votes don't "belong" to anyone other than the candidate for whom I choose to cast them. I resent the suggestion that there's anything self-satisfied about making a decision to vote for the candidate you genuinely think will do the best job. On the contrary, it's the people who cast votes because Bob probably won't do away with our civil liberties quite as quickly as Elmo that have some 'splainin to do. I count myself among this number this election, and I don't think I should or can be criticized for trying to keep those black marks on my soul to a minimum.
Edward: I'm going to repeat what I said about Greg. No comment thread schmuck is going to convince me that by voting for the Libertarian candidate for insurance commissioner of the state of California is going to prevent the boys from coming home. It's ironic that you're accusing me of "sending a message" when this is exactly what you and your lockstep Democrat friends intend to do by voting a straight ticket. You're not voting for any particular candidate; you're "sending a message" to the Republicans about their party leader's mismanagement of the country. In some sense, voting is all about sending a message. We appear to differ only on whether that message should reflect our actual feelings about who would make a better candidate or our blind hatred (perfectly justified, but nonetheless) for our Torture-happy Baboon in Chief. If a Democrat can't persuade me of his or her individual merits, well, individually, I see no point in assuring that my local dogcatcher is a by-the-book Democrat. It smacks of the worst kind of partisan groupthink.
I have a feeling we can argue this until we're both blue in the face (fingers?), and I'm not interested in that outcome. My point is that people like you win no converts when you harangue people like me for wanting to see a real alternative in this country, and attempting to do something about it instead of putting our fingers in our ears and humming "anything's better than a Republican."
If voting with your conscience means anything, it means voting with consideration toward other people, not yourself.
Scraps, I have to agree with the other commenter who mentioned your undereducated approach to the issue of voting. No. Just no. I vote for the candidate I think would make the best elected official. I don't vote for you, or for anyone else. By your line of reasoning, I'd have to be considerate of my Republican neighbors and think that perhaps they'd like me to vote for their candidate. This is where altruistic voting of the kind you're suggesting leads. I take the evidence presented to me and make my own decision, based on what I believe, not on what you or anyone else thinks is right. And your implication that "conscience" is anything other than personal judgment and decency is frankly mystifying. If you're the sort of person who separates his conscience from his judgment and decency, I'm glad you're at the other end of a comment thread and not my neighbor.
Greg, I vote for third party candidates because third parties don't always stay third parties and they need our help to assure that, someday, there are alternatives to waterboard-happy Republicans and their Democrat enablers. I vote for third party candidates because they often have a shot at minor races, and minor races give these parties credit with the voting population and the candidates in local races often have more of an impact on the day to day functions of living in a community. And most importantly, I vote for third parties because voting for either of the major parties would signal my cooperation with a corrupt regime on the one hand and on the other a major source of the notion that "we're the government and we're here to help" is actually something that most of us look forward to hearing soon. I'm thoroughly shocked that you think the Democrats--who voted for the Patriot Act in droves--are any less power-hungry or any more principled.
And I'm furthermore disgusted that some random schmuck in a comment thread has the effrontery to tell me that anything but a purely partisan, single-issue vote is really the thinking man's approach to electing a government. I'll vote my conscience and you vote yours: if enough people bothered to do just that, we wouldn't be in this wretched mess, and I wouldn't have to read your damn poetry.
Ah, it's back to who do I hate most: torture-loving, power-mad Republicans or weasely Democrats willing to co-opt the language of the right to score a few partisan points (cf. Fred Head, Mark Foley and the "connection" between pedophilia and homosexuality).
This feels so natural, so right.
Just a completely off-the-cuff, unsubstantiated theory, but I think A Gent Sammy is the same person who sent Miss S. the email from the "marketing manager" at the Cris Robins 'Agency.' There's something ineffably similar about the writing style, and A Gent, as we all know, has a sick sort of obsession with Snark. That whole "Snarkling" mistake in the salutation just screams intentional error.
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2006 | 10 |
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