The Vote

I'm in San Jose, California for my company's engineering tech summit, which happened to overlap with Super Tuesday this year. Yesterday all my colleagues (well, not ALL of them; the Romanians and Germans were almost as oblivious of the Super Tuesday hoo-hah as I was) kept asking me for whom I voted. "Oh, I'm from Pennsylvania," I reminded them. "We don't vote until it's over."

This year I have hope that this won't be the case; for once in my lifetime, we might actually make it to the Democratic Nominating Convention and actually have a debate over who gets the nomination. The votes that get cast in Pennsylvania on April 22 might actually count for something.

Of course, my vote won't be among them. My vote doesn't count because I'm an Independent. A Non-Partisan. A voter with No Party in a state that has closed primaries. Unless I can get over my amazingly strong distaste for the DNC and the horror of being associated with a party that doesn't seem to represent me (and this is equally—or more—true for the Republican party), I won't have a chance to vote for Clinton or Obama until the general election. (I did review the Republican options as well, and it's hard to imagine voting for any of them. If it were a general election today with all of the originally-declared candidates in the race, Clinton and Obama would still top the list for me.)

Perhaps the ultimate irony is that in the year I that my primary vote might actually make a difference, I'm not particularly inclined to choose between Clinton and Obama. I favor Clinton for her experience and her depth on the issues, but like Mitt Romney, I'm a bit afraid of Bill Clinton hanging out at the White House with nothing to do. (I suspect Romney was trying to plant a picture of Wild Bill screwing interns into the minds of conservative voters, whereas in my nightmare he's taking on the role of Supreme Meddler). Obama, though I think he's light on both experience and details, is charismatic and thoughtful, and would be a bold choice with less baggage. I can't seem to forget that when a reporter asked him early in the campaign which books he was reading currently, he responded, "I'll have to get back to you on that," though.

Posted by Lori in politics at 11:09 AM on February 6, 2008

Comments (5)

Eson:

Who do you think has the best health care plan ? I think Hillary has a better outlook there. Your right Obama is more inexperienced and his background is blank until he tells you about it, but he is smart.

eson:

Hillary also comes from the heart alot more than anybody I've seen, ever since she was a senator, she never really read from paper. From the heart to the head and out the mouth, I like that.

Lori [TypeKey Profile Page]:

I'm not sure I fully understand all the details of her plan, but from what she described during the last debate I saw, it sounds like she learned a lot from her experience in 1994.

As for Obama, a friend send me this link to a post written back before Obama had declared for the presidency, and it made me feel better about him:

http://tinyurl.com/ypd3v7

This experience would seem to make him more suited to be a Vice President than a President, IMHO (I read a great book about that once, how governors tend to be more successful at President, and senators more successful at Vice President—and how being VP doesn't really prepare you in any way to be President), but it speaks to his record thus far, and his ability to find the common ground between people. While I don't agree with Erin Kotecki Vest's plea to Hillary to quit the race ( http://tinyurl.com/32cna9 ), I do agree that she's a divider, not a uniter. We could use a little unity in this country right now.

eson:

For what reasons do you think she is a divider though ?

Lori [TypeKey Profile Page]:

I'm not exactly sure *why* she divides; I just know that as Erin put it, she evokes a visceral response from many—as did/does her husband. I thought Bill Clinton was a good president and an even better campaigner, and I kind of assumed, back in the 90s, that it was the general consensus. I think Hillary sounded a bit nuts when she pointed to the "vast, right-wing conspiracy" during the Monica Lewinsky thing, but I did come to see, after Clinton left office, that there was a huge contingent of Americans who HATED Bill Clinton. LOATHED him. Thought he was the devil himself. The same is true for Hillary, I think partly because she's associated with Bill, and partly because she's seen as a liberal manipulator who had way more power than she should have during Bill's tenure. (I don't agree with that assessment, but it's out there.)

George W. Bush divides in much the same way; it's hard for me to imagine that ANYONE could even respect him, much less *like* him, but obviously lots of people do, or he wouldn't have been elected (whether or not he won the popular vote in 2000 is sort of moot; roughly half the country voted for him is my point). I think he's a dangerous, ill-prepared, thoughtless nutjob, but that's me.

Obama, on the other hand, seems to unite people. His support crosses color, gender, and even party lines. The same is true for McCain. I don't think the same is true for Hillary. I wouldn't be surprised to learn of Republicans voting for Obama in the general election or Democrats voting for McCain, but I'd be shocked to hear of Republicans voting for Hillary.

Comments

Who do you think has the best health care plan ? I think Hillary has a better outlook there. Your right Obama is more inexperienced and his background is blank until he tells you about it, but he is smart.

Posted by: Eson at February 19, 2008 9:32 PM

Hillary also comes from the heart alot more than anybody I've seen, ever since she was a senator, she never really read from paper. From the heart to the head and out the mouth, I like that.

Posted by: eson at February 19, 2008 9:49 PM

I'm not sure I fully understand all the details of her plan, but from what she described during the last debate I saw, it sounds like she learned a lot from her experience in 1994.

As for Obama, a friend send me this link to a post written back before Obama had declared for the presidency, and it made me feel better about him:

http://tinyurl.com/ypd3v7

This experience would seem to make him more suited to be a Vice President than a President, IMHO (I read a great book about that once, how governors tend to be more successful at President, and senators more successful at Vice President—and how being VP doesn't really prepare you in any way to be President), but it speaks to his record thus far, and his ability to find the common ground between people. While I don't agree with Erin Kotecki Vest's plea to Hillary to quit the race ( http://tinyurl.com/32cna9 ), I do agree that she's a divider, not a uniter. We could use a little unity in this country right now.

Posted by: Lori [TypeKey Profile Page] at February 20, 2008 11:16 AM

For what reasons do you think she is a divider though ?

Posted by: eson at February 20, 2008 12:39 PM

I'm not exactly sure *why* she divides; I just know that as Erin put it, she evokes a visceral response from many—as did/does her husband. I thought Bill Clinton was a good president and an even better campaigner, and I kind of assumed, back in the 90s, that it was the general consensus. I think Hillary sounded a bit nuts when she pointed to the "vast, right-wing conspiracy" during the Monica Lewinsky thing, but I did come to see, after Clinton left office, that there was a huge contingent of Americans who HATED Bill Clinton. LOATHED him. Thought he was the devil himself. The same is true for Hillary, I think partly because she's associated with Bill, and partly because she's seen as a liberal manipulator who had way more power than she should have during Bill's tenure. (I don't agree with that assessment, but it's out there.)

George W. Bush divides in much the same way; it's hard for me to imagine that ANYONE could even respect him, much less *like* him, but obviously lots of people do, or he wouldn't have been elected (whether or not he won the popular vote in 2000 is sort of moot; roughly half the country voted for him is my point). I think he's a dangerous, ill-prepared, thoughtless nutjob, but that's me.

Obama, on the other hand, seems to unite people. His support crosses color, gender, and even party lines. The same is true for McCain. I don't think the same is true for Hillary. I wouldn't be surprised to learn of Republicans voting for Obama in the general election or Democrats voting for McCain, but I'd be shocked to hear of Republicans voting for Hillary.

Posted by: Lori [TypeKey Profile Page] at February 20, 2008 12:57 PM

Comments are now closed.