WASHINGTON – For some reason people think they have a moral obligation to police your vote.
Your vote.
In the second decade of the 21st century, nothing is more outdated, with the growth of the independent voter proving this fact. What it reveals is that people are getting increasingly disgruntled with only two choices and the people Democrats and Republicans nominate. If President Obama wins the Electoral College, but Mitt Romney wins the popular vote, which has been postulated by the polling geeks, this discontent is likely to grow, because the American electorate will have finally outgrown the founder’s system, which will have been proven twice in twelve years.
The bombast for daring to encourage progressives to use their vote as a cudgel has only grown louder over Obama’s first term. Considering Barack Obama came in with epic fanfare it’s a remarkable shift.
There are reasons to vote to reelect President Obama, which can be read through endorsements from the New York Times to the Nation.
There are reasons not to reelect Barack Obama as well.
Unless you are a progressive or Democratic member, with your vote seen as belonging to The Party. Your very independence is not only threatening to your party keeping power, but it is automatically less principled, because you have found a reason to vote against your party’s own interest, which could hand power to an opposing force. It’s seen as political treason and is treated as such.
When you think about Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan winning the November election it is hair-raising on many levels. It also brings the vision of fantasy fairies rising up to fight the right! But it is understandable that partisan Democrats are making the case that if you’re a progressive you owe it to the progress of progressive causes to vote Democratic. Hold your nose if you have to, but just do it.
Romney-Ryan awaits if you don’t.
Remember Ralph Nader in 2000.
Forget all about the inability of Al Gore to win on his own.
It’s always the fault of the growing number of independent voters, never the candidate or his compromises, or the inevitable changing times as Democrats and Republicans both represent corporations over we the people, which is where we are today.
The Tea Party’s rise taught multiple lessons, even if progressive egotism didn’t allow for teaching; from crazy candidates to those who made it into the congressional power base. The right’s rise is not pretty, as we see every day on cable and across this country through legislation, but corporations are considered people now, so they have a flag planted firmly in Congress.
Back in January, for US News & World Report, I wrote that progressives needed their own Tea Party-esque rebellion. If that had happened even earlier Barack Obama might have been a better candidate and the policies being considered in his second term would be something more than compromised and conservative.
One of the poster boy’s for corporate America, Steve Rattner, former Obama administration official and economist for “Morning Joe,” has not only openly cheered for Elizabeth Warren’s demise in Massachusetts, but has bragged about giving money to defeat her. It’s all a big joke on the show. Now he’s rallying corporate America to call Congress and press a grand bargain or Simpson Bowles type legislation during the lame duck, with Joe Scarborough saying, to paraphrase, that if Jamie Dimon calls Congress they’ll listen.
That’s the problem. The reason a very small part of the electorate won’t hold their nose anymore to vote Democratic.
There’s a very good case being made by progressives. With Obama, at least progressives will get into the conversation, but with Romney they won’t have a chance. That’s as inarguable as it is powerful, unless you consider the compromises in Obamacare, the kill lists, the drone policy, codifying Hyde for the first time in history, something even George W. Bush didn’t try. Oh! Wait! Free contraception, so women should just ignore the rest. We are our ovaries. A seat at the table is better than being left outside banging on the door, never mind that’s exactly where progressives have been left on foreign policy, too big to fail, entitlements, and on and on.
In Obama’s second term there will be no political repercussions for him, there is only legacy. From predatory lending and foreclosures to patriarchal deals with the Wall Street elite, women get hit harder than men through Obama’s policies, with one man’s grand bargain an older woman’s cost of living Social Security increase, which adds up over time.
Then again, Romney-Ryan want to voucherize, then privatize, so they will be much worse.
Austerity won in 2010 and it’s still winning on both sides, it’s just a matter of degree. But the degree counts when you do the math.
There is also the choice to vote for someone with whom you actually agree, even if the person you’re voting for is in a lost cause election fight, principle over getting power, a message sent. Voting for Jill Stein, Rocky Anderson or Gary Johnson, among others. Maybe you just trust the underdog over the 1% politician. A person who hasn’t had to compromise, which is inevitably the case with any president in the modern era, because of the factions it takes to make deals and cobble together a winning majority, however minute.
When all is said and read, it remains your vote and the chattering rabble from web to infotainment TV don’t get a say, because you don’t have to vote and tell.
Just remember you are responsible for all of the policies implemented if your man wins. You are voting for all of his agenda, not just the one issue that is your personal reason for voting for him. It’s all or nothing and if you don’t like the outcome you have no one to blame but yourself.
Taylor Marsh, a veteran political analyst and former Huffington Post contributor, is the author of The Hillary Effect, available at Barnes and Noble and on Amazon. Her new-media blog www.taylormarsh.com covers national politics, women and power.
Paul Szep editorial cartoon used with permission.