Here’s a response to this oft-heard/read opinion, ‘whoever is the Democratic candidate, vote Blue.’
First, too early to ‘ring that bell’, the jousting has only just begun.
Secondly, to do so, admits a kind of defeatism that one doesn’t believe in their chosen candidacy, or worse, a candidate doesn’t have anything else to offer other than they have a ‘D’ next to their name.
This rationale needs to stop! It’ll guarantee another four years with Putin’s Agent Orange.
When voting, who wins General Elections and ushers in eras of economic prosperity and social progress for the greatest amount of ‘We the People?’
Moderates do; FDR, HST, DDE, LBJ, Clinton, Obama. When Democrats skew too far left, McGovern, Carter, Dukakis, Nader, we’ve had the recessionary-causing and regressive reactionary results, Nixon, Reagan, Bush I, ‘W’ respectively, and now Trump in 2016 with the distraction of Sanders in spite of the Moderate Hillary Clinton trouncing Sanders in the Primaries and winning 3 million more popular votes in the General Election; a sign that with ALL the propaganda connivances of both the Right and Left, the beligerences of the ‘Bernie Bros’ opting out or voting for Trump, ‘the woman,’ the Moderate, STILL carried the majority and would be leading a new era of prosperity and social progress if not for the Democratic Party’s efforts to lurch Left.
The slave-based Electoral College compounded the 2016 outcome; it’s always been a convservatively skewed institution when voter turn out is weak as it was and will be if the choices are between Trump and Sanders. The ol’ arch-conservative reprobate, William F. Buckley, Jr. admonished the GOP, ‘to maintain White Supremacy in America, the party must hold the South and rely on the Electoral College.’ He was intoning the plaints of the slave-owning Virginians amongst the Founding Fathers who contrived the 3⁄5 Compromise that lead to the Electoral College’s establishment. In these contexts of the historical facts, shall we repeat with a mindset that “any Democrat will do?!”
Another context, Sanders IS not a true Democrat, let alone one in longstanding; an ineffective Independent with a dismal legislative track record in both houses of Congress. Bloomberg? Warren? Both are former Republicans who switched when the political opportunities were shifting in their respective local environments, not necessarily moderate or Democratic credentials.
Finally, this ‘vote Party, whomever the candidate is’ ethos is the same one exuded by the GOP that begat Trump as their Party standard-bearer way over due to country and “We the People.” The GOP members are stuck with him and his Orange taint will forever stain the party’s ethos and moral stance or lack of it in all its glorious hypocrisies.
I for one, am a Moderate Democrat because, at least, I’ve believed the party has taken the higher road, more so than the other major party, and chosen well-reasoned, thoughtful and moderate leaders who had a mindset that could embrace the widest swath of who we are as Americans, fiscally and socially. The above-mentioned Left-leaning choices have given this Moderate great pause (exception was McGovern only because it was clear Nixon was a disaster); Dukakis was such a Left disaster I actually voted for Bush I despite his parts in the egregious disastrous Reagan Era.
So, Party over country? Hmmmm? Elections are, in great part, a call-to-duty by every eligible citizen to rise above the narrow and selfish points-of-view and opt for what is good, if not great, for the largest whole of “We the People.”
Many have such consternation within this current era, in great part, because this is an epoch of great selfishness with one Party putting its grasp of power, and wealth, way above the greater interests of us all as a nation. This only serves a few and those who have to compete with us on a world stage for security and resources.
It is a very telling sign when the Sanders camp intones this “vote Blue no matter the candidate.” It says their content doesn’t matter, they’re relying on the ‘hate’ some have towards Trump.
How’s that hate culture working from the Right? Offering more of the same will only stymie our progress as a people, a nation.
—eric ward
Flommist Eric Ward is a Human Los Angelino (there are other kinds), humanist, artist, industrial and graphic designer, novelist, toy inventor and entrepreneur. Life-long pursuit is “What to do with a piece of paper?” Copyright © 2020 Eric Ward. Image: Thomas Nast, Political Cartoon (cropped), Harper’s Weekly, 1879, source.
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