Since turning 18, I have never not voted. In every election in which I’ve been eligible—local, state, and national—I have cast a ballot.
Maybe it’s because I had parents who lived during the civil rights era. They made sure I knew what me right to vote had cost. They encouraged me to vote even when there are no good choices. My dad used to say to me, “If you cant find someone to vote for, find someone to vote against. But vote.
Now it appears that in the Maryland primary on February 12 I’ll have no one to vote for.
Democrat Dennis Kucinich is abandoning his second, long-shot bid for the White House as he faces a tough fight to hold onto his other job _ U.S. congressman.
In an interview with Cleveland’s Plain Dealer, the six-term House member said he was quitting the race and would make a formal announcement on Friday.
“I will be announcing that I’m transitioning out of the presidential campaign,” Kucinich said. “I’m making that announcement tomorrow about a new direction.”
Kucinich has received little support in his presidential bid; he got 1 percent of the vote in the New Hampshire primary and was shut out in the Iowa caucuses. He did have a devoted following.
So, I guess I’m sitting things out until November. I had looked forward to having the opportunity to vote my hopes in the primaries—to vote for someone. Now, I guess I’ll just fold my arms until I know who I’m voting against in November, and who I’m settling for.
And before anyone jumps on me, I will vote in the general election. I just can’t see myself getting excited about or supporting any of the remaining Democratic candidates with any degree of enthusiasm. Of those who remain, Mike Gravel is the only who supports marriage equality, but he loses me with his whole tax position. At this point, the least unsatisfactory Democrat in my view may be John Edwards, but I can’t work up a good head of steam over him either.
And it’s more than “just” gay issues (though I think that’s rather dismissive of the day-to-day concerns in the lives of many gay Americans). It’s the way the entire discourse has been artificially and arbitrarily narrowed, typified by media efforts to shut Kucinich out of one debate and then another, and to keep him off the ballot entirely in at least one state.
The effect is to take certain issues off the table, and diminish the discourse.
Much is made of the populist turn the presidential race has taken as economic conditions have worsened. But when none of the other candidates were taking pointed stands on trade policy, the mortgage crisis and real health-care reform, it was Kucinich who staked out precise positions and forced the other candidates to offer working Americans more than mere rhetoric.
…One of things that most debate moderators found so frustrating about Kucinich was his determination to talk about the bread-and-butter issues that matter most to working Americans, rather than to play their games. Kucinich forced the anchormen and the reporters, as well as the other candidates, to pay a little attention to the problems of factory workers, shop clerks and farmers. There is no question that the Ohioan’s determination to do this influenced more prominent and well-funded contenders, especially former North Carolina Senator John Edwards.
Kucinich never got much credit from the media or the other candidates. But he influenced the national debate for the better, and the race for the Democratic presidential nomination is diminished by his exit.
I’m sure there are people who could tell me, with great eloquence, why I should support one of the remaining—and apparently corporate-approved—candidates. I don’t see much difference between them, though, and I’m not convinced that any of them need my vote in the primaries or will miss having it.
But it’s not just that which has me thinking about sitting out the primaries now. It’s what the process has become, who gets heard and who doesn’t, and who decides. It’s clear that I won’t get to choose the candidate I want in the primary, unless I write his name in. But it’s also clear that I don’t need to choose.
A candidate will be chosen for me, and perhaps has been chosen already. I just have to wait until November to find out who I’m settling for.
Well, yeah, but…
I am old enough to have lived through political assassinations. Whenever a decent candidate came along he was inevitably marginalized, made the butt of a media joke, the subject of a sex scandal, etc.
There are primaries before the primaries, and the most important one is the question of how much fealty a candidate has to the owner class. Take faith that Kucinich lasted as long as he did without getting shot.
He was metaphorically shot by being marginalized by the media. There was no need for drastic measures because he was never allowed to be a threat, a real threat.
Exactly super, assassination by the corporate media without the blood.
The same has happened to John Edwards. So what we are left with is Hillary or Obama. Different flavors perhaps, but still the same ole recipe I’m afraid.
Of those three, Edwards is the least unappealing to me. He comes off as less disingenuous than the other two and, at least for me, he speaks more specifically to the American working class and the hardships that are building up on them/me/us. His anti-corporate stance, and how they prey on the weak, is also appealing to a degree. That is, if he is to be believed. And I really have no basis to believe what any of them claim or promise anymore. But, at least within those top three, he stands out. Which doesn’t really say much. I could vote for him in my (NY) primary, but he won’t be around in the general. Not that I would vote for him there either.
It’s a drag having this level of pessimism, and if I were an average voter reading what I’ve written I’d probably see me as defeatest and naive. But I’m far from alone in this bleak outlook. Especially in this current go-round. Even BooMan was ready to throw up his hands it seems over the apparent FISA capitulation. When partisans like him get to that level of frustration, it’s pretty bad.
Take care
I’ll be voting for Edwards Feb 5 in hopes that at least his voice will still be heard for a while longer. And I’m sorry to say, for me it’s worth something to vote against Hillary — I really want to see Bill lose, and may even still feel that way in the general. Hard to tell right now.
It’s been decades since the Dem nominee was somebody I could get enthusiastic about, so I don’t see anything new this time around. Frankly, it seems to me your (and my) kind of sullen attitude only works in favor of the neo-fascists. And I’ve probably finally given up the hope that if things got bad enough, Americans would remember we’re supposed to be the heirs of a revolution. So yeah, we’ll take what the bosses decide to serve, but pablum probably beats strychnine if one wants to be around to fight another day, or just to learn to find humor in the machinations of the Big Evil.
‘Course, the thing about USA Brand fascism seems to be that attitudes sullen or otherwise make minimal difference to the overall picture. The people are basically irrelevant, aside of the crucial minor percentage keeping the whole show afloat.
Should members of the majority ever become really sullen, specialists can be employed to smooth the waters, accountable to no one but their employers.
I’ve only skipped some local elections since coming of voting age. But this trip has me seriously considering for the first time, not voting at all, primary or general. I had intended to vote for Kucinich in the primary, like I did in 04, while going on to vote for Kerry the capitulator in the general. And I’m a Green. This time though, I think my crossover, lesser of two evils voting is over.
Thing is, this time I’m hearing less opposition to not voting at all than I have before because I think a lot more people are really considering sitting out because the choices are so unappealing for so many of us.
Unfortunately I’m coming to the conclusion that it’s no longer in my best interest to give my vote to candidates who give nothing in return for it, and who more and more are outright doing the opposite of what they sold themselves to me when the asked for my vote and needed my vote. You touched on this in your other post today about pandering to anti-gay ministers by so called progressive candidates and how the gay community dutifully gives it’s votes even as they are taken for granted by the politicians they reward. If you keep rewarding them for doing nothing they’ll continue to do nothing because there’s no incentive to change. So what am I gaining when I give away my vote once again? Nothing so far as I’m concerned. I think the only way to change the system now is to withold my vote and in that way contribute to the downfall of the party and the entire political system, because I (sadly) see it as the only way anything viable for us, the people, can ever come to be.
Peace
I agree. It hasn’t been an easy decision for me to come to, to decide that I can’t continue to vote Dem just because of the D behind someones name. A very very hard decision in fact and has taken me years to get to this point. And a large part of this is due to the fact that so few Dems have the courage to fight, really fight for equality for friends of mine who are gay. I’m tired of ‘don’t ask-don’t tell’, I’m tired of my friends living in the shadows of equality even if they happen to be openly gay. I’m sick and tired of it.
I’t’s fine and dandy if some politician wants to preach tolerance(I despise that term by the way)but if they ain’t gonna fight how are things going to change? I don’t want to ‘hope’ for change I want to see change.
No taxation without representation…still true.
Anyway I think the either the dem party needs a big shock like maybe losing this election after all to get back to the basics of the dem platform -the progressive dem platform or they will continue to be simply the other corporate party. The Green Party Platform is where the Dems should be at.
It’s tough too, when you’re labeled as naive, and/or ignorant of reality. What I am is tired and demoralized. I’m finally through being shit on and ignored. While high crimes are being openly commited and elected and appointed government figures are selling our nuclear knowledge to Pakistan, and a brave woman, Sibel Edmonds, is risking her life to come forward, democrats like Waxman have the power to take them all down and pledged his intention to do so when he and the democrats needed votes to gain that power, but like all the rest is nowhere to be found now that he and they no longer need our votes. When our country is in grave danger and principled fighters are needed now more than ever, they are all, save for a tiny few, like Senator Dodd, thumbing their noses at us and taking all constitutional remedies and protections “off the table”!
Also, it’s no longer realistic, I think, to believe that we can chip away at the conservative democrats and incrementally replace them with more left leaning people when you see the most left leaning of them like Waxman and Conyers and so many others are the one’s refusing to do anything about the threats to the country. The presidential candidates, at least the only ones the media allows any time to, are all rolling rightward. I hear this nonsense that they have to in order to appeal to enough to all voters, but what are we all losing along the way? Why should Terrence have to vote for a candidate who panders to leaders who hate him for his orientation? It’s absurd and self defeating.
All I know is that the more I’m told to hang in there and help put a bigger majority in place because that’s the only solution, the worse the entire atmosphere has been getting across the board. The deeper we we get in debt. The less rights and personal freedoms and protections we have. The more we act like and now have become a roguie nation who strikes first and asks questions later.
The more we accept that torture is an American value. That millions and more millions have no medical coverage and are one illness away from disaster. That the American dream, fucking Bush’s ownership society, is bullshit and we’re all losing our homes. I’ve lost mine, and I’m one hard working S.O.B. It doesn’t matter. Workers are dirt in this country now. Gas has friggin tripled in price since Bush got his dirty mitts on the pumps. And on and fucking on….
And people exhort us to elect more democrats. How’s that been working out for us so far? Not especially well….
But I’m not bitter! LOL! :o)
It’s rare that I vote FOR someone, but the lesst bad is still the least bad. I find that it helps to accept that they are all politicians and try to pick one that will do some good while helping himself. I tell myself that if I can survive voting for a crook (Edwin Edwards) to keep a klansman out (David Duke), I can survive this one too.
If you want to do something proactive about having a better choice of candidates, promote election reforms such as:
Public financed campaigns
Debates sponsored by non-corporate groups, like the League of Women Voters
The Fairness Doctrine
Instant Runoff Elections