Why I am (still) undecided

[Blue State Blues]

This is my first thread post in GD-P and will probably be my last, so I’ll try to make it count. It will be long and will not include any facts or links, so you should probably stop reading now and leave me to my incoherent ramblings.

Still here? Well, you were warned.

First off, let me say as a disclaimer to any statements to follow that I am a yellow dog dem. In the general election, MY candidate is any creature with a D next to its name.

The primary, however, is a whole 'nother story, And my primary is today so I have just a few hours left to gnaw on this decision.

In years past, by the time my primary rolled around there really wasn't a choice, so I suppose this time I should be thankful that things are so close and so exciting and this day isn’t just an empty symbolic step toward coronation.

And so I am torn. How to vote? Should I vote my conscience? Should I vote strategically?

If I were to vote my conscience, well, then I would write-in Gore. But I’m not quite Quixotic enough to vote for him today. My next choice, closest to my conscience, would be to vote for Edwards. Still a somewhat Quixotic choice, but perhaps enough mad fools like myself will do so in my state to give him another delegate or two with which to bargain at the convention. He is on my ballot, so I just might cast my vote for him in the hope he’ll do some good with it. But hope is not a strategy.

And perhaps what this contest needs is strategy. Of the two media-selected, corporate-financed contenders, which would be the more strategic vote? Which one would win the GE against McCain, the full bag of dirty tricks, and the complicit media? If I could tell the future, this would be an easier decision, but I can only wonder and guess.

Should I cast my vote for Hillary? She speaks with a voice of experience, this former Goldwater Girl, she has organized and triangulated and compromised and made deals … that dirty business of politics that gets things done. And she CAN get things done. But would she try to do the things I want, the things our country desperately needs? Or would her agenda be shaped by the needs of her corporate donors? Can she make compromises without being compromised?

Of course, that’s a question for any elected official, not just Hillary.

Then there’s the Hillary hatred to contend with. Living in the south when Bill was running for the first time, I was amazed by the unreasoned venom cast at her. They really hate her. They hate her for not changing her name when she married; they hate her for changing it when she did. They hate her for hairstyles and pant suits and cookies she bakes or doesn’t bake and for everything she says or doesn’t say. They hate her for being an uppity female. They hate her for just being.

But on a scale of 1 to 10, they already hate her at a 10, so they can’t hate her any more than they do already. And they wouldn’t vote for Obama either. With Obama in the GE, they might stay home. With Hillary in the GE, they might hold their noses and vote McCain to vote against her. Might. Maybe. Who knows?

As a woman, I’m familiar with the damned if you do and damned if you don’t double standard that allows her to do nothing right. I can sympathize. It sucks. But that alone isn’t enough to earn my vote.

I respect Hillary, and yet Hillary has disappointed me. She has made poor, calculated decisions that she must now try to defend (IWR) and she has pandered to the right in ways that have earned her no goodwill from them, but have cost her with me. I mean, seriously, flag burning? Flag burning? To paraphrase "President" Bartlet, Is there an epidemic of flag burning of which I am unaware?

And there’s the Maggie Thatcher syndrome to consider -- would President Hillary Clinton feel compelled to use military force at every opportunity just to prove she isn’t weak?

So I could cast a vote for Hillary, the known quantity, or then there is the change candidate, Obama.

I have much less to ponder about Obama. I know relatively so little about him. He has charisma, to be sure, but that really counts as a negative with me (I’m a Gore fan, after all).

Obama is inspirational. He energizes the youth and can bring waves of them to the polls to support him (whether their votes will be fairly counted is a different question, though). He oozes with celebrity endorsements, but to the extent I like him, it’s more in spite of endorsements than because of them.

Obama has a shorter record, much shorter. But even a short record can be problematic. I don’t like the "present" votes, or the missed votes, or the general pattern of playing it safe so his record will be pristine for future polling. Would first term President Obama also play it so safe to try to ensure a second term? Once in office, what would he do?

He speaks about unifying the country, but I wonder, if "unity" means cosmetically smoothing over the very real and very deep divisions, is that really for the best right now?

So, it’s down to the devil we know and the devil we don’t know. Which one can win? And what would she or he do in office afterward?

I wonder which candidate will be most likely to investigate and doggedly prosecute the abuses of the current administration. Healing unity can only come after the cancer is removed.

Which corporate-funded candidate will pander to us most often and which one will pander to us on more important issues? Which candidate will disappoint us less (though I’ve been around long enough to know the only guarantee is that we will be disappointed)?

Neither candidate is an outsider. Obama represents the Kennedy democrats; Hillary, the Clinton democrats. Two cliques vying for power within the party, both with plenty of sins to live down for those of us whose memories are long.

Of course, an having outsider isn’t always a good thing, as we learned with Jimmy Carter, probably the most principled man to ever hold the job, but who failed to play the game with congress. Think for a minute what our world would now be like if only we had heeded his call to conserve energy, invest in alternative fuels, and deal fairly with foreign nations.

And yet, whatever misgivings I have about the candidates, either President Clinton or President Obama would be far, far preferable for the future than the unmitigated disaster that would be President McCain.

So of course, those are the stakes. The future. And that is why I cannot sit home and let others decide. Why I still ponder and fret and gnaw on this decision.

I go to vote in an hour.

Will I vote my ideals and my conscience and damn the consequences?

Will I find a path through the strategy that solves the unanswered questions?

Or will I just flip a coin?

I don't know. I still don’t know.

[jillan]

1. Follow your heart - that's all you can do.