Voting 2008...

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Imp-Chan
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Voting 2008...

Post by Imp-Chan »

The situation has now reached a point where, despite my deep resentment at being forced to do so, I will be voting for Obama in this year's presidential election.

Do I believe in Obama? No, I do not. Do I want him to be the next president? Not particularly. Do I believe it is right to vote for a candidate you have no confidence in? No.

Yet I will be doing so, because there is the possibility that my inaction as a voter would allow people into office who would be disastrous not just for this country, but for the entire world. It's no longer just an ugly set of possibilities if McCain gets elected, nor is it an option to leave the country if I can no longer stand our politics (though Poe and I are researching what it would take to relocate, and are united in our determination to do so if our votes fail). Now if McCain got elected, I feel confident there would be nowhere safer to go, but it would be even less safe to stay.

So I will vote for Obama, despite my lack of confidence in his abilities. Better an ineffectual agent for mostly positive change than even the possibility that McCain and Palin be allowed to grasp the power that the last eight years have systematically gained for the executive branch. I may not believe in the action of voting for a candidate one does not want, but I cannot believe it to be worse in this case than inaction, even if I strongly disagree with the process itself and resent being forced to use it.

I am so very angry with our country right now. I love the ideas on which it was founded, I love the land and the people, but the sheer corruption of who we are and what we once believed in evidenced by this election leaves me feeling deeply sick. Right now, I am ashamed to be an American, and no outcome of this year's election will correct that.

>.<'
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Sareth
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Re: Voting 2008...

Post by Sareth »

I can respect your views, but I have a slightly different perspective. Just figured I'd share, and please don't take it as a criticism. It's not meant as such.

I cannot in good conscience vote for either McCain OR Obama. Looking at their positions and their politics I do not respect either of them. Their positions, in my perspective, are equally bad. Both would take the nation in directions I find unconscionable.

So what am I to do?

People keep telling me to vote for "the least bad candidate." But to my perspective, I'd still be voting for the bad candidate.

There's still a couple months left, they may do something to change my mind, but at this point I'm looking for a third party candidate. Many may argue that I am throwing my vote away, but doing this does two things for me.

1) I can feel proud of my vote, that I voted for what I believe in, rather than selling myself to something I don't believe in.

2) If enough of us vote third party, perhaps the dems and repubs will begin to realize they are loosing the American public, and that if they don't start listening to the people they supposedly represent, a third party WILL take their toys from them and they will deserve it.

Anyway... Good luck to us all.
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Re: Voting 2008...

Post by Viking-Sensei »

I still think McCain is deliberately throwing this election... he's a maverick, after all, and possibly the greatest American hero we've had in ages for taking one for the team.
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Graybeard
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Re: Voting 2008...

Post by Graybeard »

I'm curious how this election looks to people outside the U S of A. There are Canadian, and overseas, readers here. Could some of you folks share views, ideally of those around you as well as your own?

I don't share the cynicism of many of the people in this thread about this particular election. On the contrary, for the first time in quite a few years, there actually appear to be two people running who have both the intellectual and political oomph to take on some hard problems, and leadership qualities to drag the rest of Washington -- and the public -- kicking and screaming into possible solutions. The thing is, though, it may not matter. The current administration is bequeathing the next one such a huge number of really horrendous messes that IMO, there is a very good chance that the next administration will be viewed as a one-term, "unsuccessful" one, regardless of what it actually does, and that a Lincoln or Roosevelt or Kennedy wouldn't do any better. Think of George H. W. Bush (Senior, that is, not his idiot son). It fell to that guy to tidy up the mess that Reagan made of the economy, the deficit, etc., and for taking it on, he was "rewarded" with a one-term presidency. I have immense respect for the man (despite having voted against him in both elections) for having the guts to do what he did, and look what it got him -- and he didn't have half the legacy of disaster to clean up that the next administration will.

Feel pity for whoever wins this election.
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Re: Voting 2008...

Post by Viking-Sensei »

Also... I'm a little surprised I haven't seen more about this in the press, because this is one of the first things that occured to me after he made one of those big important and epic speeches mid-way through the primaries (the fantastic "Let's all be grownups about race, ok?" speech in the wake of Crazypastorgate) but being the first significant-percentage-black president in the history of the US is going to draw the nutcases out of the woodwork to Obama. I mean, there were already a trioka of gun-toting bomb-packing rednecks in pickup trucks attempting to assassinate him before he even accepted the position last week in Denver. It's only going to get worse from here...

That's why I think that the VP picks are more important this time around than ever before... because, let's face it, there's a decent chance that either of the front-runners are going to possibly die in office.

After all, assassination attempts nonwithstanding, McCain is old, and I'm not saying that as a slam to him so much as a statement of fact... he's really old, has had multiple health problems in the past, and even if he doesn't "die" die, he might still have to be removed from office for any number of other health (both physical and mental) reasons.
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Re: Voting 2008...

Post by LordofNightmares »

OBAMA OBAMA OBAMA need I say more.
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Drannin
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Re: Voting 2008...

Post by Drannin »

Well...

Speaking as a Canadian, we're sort of accustomed to voting for the "least awful candidate." I mean, Canadian politics is a joke, and someone forgot the punchline. But about American politics:

Whoever wins, Life Will Go On. Maybe it will be a little rougher. Maybe it will be a little easier. But it will go on, no matter what imbecile gets voted into office. That's a lesson we've learned up here.

Honestly, the whole election looks like a spectator sport to me, with people rooting on their team because, well, that's their team, and they don't care about anything. I believe that's called partisanship, and it can be a little annoying. Just look at the Hilary-philes who absolutely refuse to even listen to Obama. Their "team" lost to his so he's been blacklisted by them. That's not the way to vote.

Anyway, both sides have their pros and cons. Obama is a little green, honestly, but he may also be innovative a fresh. He might be what the US needs. McCain is yet another Old White Guy, but he is at least somewhat competent (at least as far as I can tell).

In any case, whoever gets elected, life will go on. But I really don't envy the next president. Dubbya kind of made a mess of things. At least from my Northern perspective.
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Re: Voting 2008...

Post by Tiamat »

Drannin wrote:In any case, whoever gets elected, life will go on. But I really don't envy the next president. Dubbya kind of made a mess of things. At least from my Northern perspective.
Dubya made a mess of things from any perspective that's not 2 feet into his own colon. The man is an idiot, and the only reason I'm voting for Obama is because I strongly believe that McCain's economic policies will spell doom for the country. I'm particularly displeased about Obama's tax plan's, notably increasing taxes on people above the 200,000 income mark - My parents already shuffle off 30% of their income as it is and have absolutely no recourse because they aren't rich enough to have a private accountant but they're 'too rich' for any tax deductions. As it stands they don't know if they're going to be able to retire or not, especially with social security so far in the hole.

Still, looking on what the last 8 years has wrought makes it worth it, in my eyes.
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Re: Voting 2008...

Post by Imp-Chan »

Sareth wrote:I cannot in good conscience vote for either McCain OR Obama. Looking at their positions and their politics I do not respect either of them. Their positions, in my perspective, are equally bad. Both would take the nation in directions I find unconscionable.
This is exactly where I was sitting until I researched Palin. The goal being to not have to expatriate, and me being completely unwilling to live in a country where she is even remotely in charge, I feel like I should at least try to get to stay here.

However, I don't like it, and in fact I am violently sickened by the whole affair. Like you, I don't feel it's a good choice to vote for either candidate, and if I could live with the consequences of not doing so I'd certainly be indulging that conscience.

-_-'

Edit for passing thought: I wonder what would happen if enough people were pissed about the choices so that there could be successful sit-ins held to protest the election? That seems like it should be a novel, somewhere.
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Re: Voting 2008...

Post by Graybeard »

Impy (and others), what are you going to do about your CONGRESSIONAL elections? One of the challenges the next president will face is a Congress that has become intensely, hatefully polarized, to the point where rational, constructive debate of national problems is next to impossible. That's going to persist as a problem for whoever wins the presidential election, and it'll be one of the (many) things that makes his job nightmarish.

My personal reaction on that one is "Throw The Rascals Out." Our district is currently represented by a Democrat in the House of Representatives; I will vote for the Republican in that race. Our Republican senator is retiring; I will vote for the Democrat in the race to replace him. We've got to get the message to these people that it's time to start acting like adults, rather than bickering children or elves.
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