2020-03-08

The Sum Of Our Choices




Ballots for the Washington State 2020 Presidential Primary are due on March 10.  Yesterday, I filled mine out, voting for Elizabeth Warren.  If I had taken my own advice, I should have voted for Warren and mailed it the day that I received it, on February 20.  Regrettably, there was still a bit of the old savvy Political Science major in me who studied the primary calendar and decided that waiting until after Super Tuesday (March 3) might provide additional information.  This was a foolish conceit.

Ever since the Washington primary ballots were finalized in January, I knew that Warren was the only acceptable choice.  She is clearly more qualified than any of the other candidates on the ballot, and she's the only one who has demonstrated an appreciation of the threat that the fascists pose to our government.  The fact that I would even consider some kind of "strategic voting" for someone I didn't prefer to stop someone worse is one of the greatest flaws of allowing the general public to select a party's nominee.

"Electability" is a chimera.  Perhaps, with a massive aggregation of polls and harvested consumer data over a long enough timeline, there is a way to objectively estimate a given candidate's chances to some degree of certainty, but the amount of resources and attention required is beyond individual voters.  A real party would restrict this crucial function to people who have the long-term interests of the party in mind, and who can afford to donate time more than money.  People like me should only be asked which candidate we ourselves prefer, not who we guess most other people prefer.

I have no real idea why the Democratic primary race has shaken out as it has.  I have plenty of suspicions, most of which flatter my prior opinions.  Regardless of the causation, it is a goddamn shame that American electorate cannot recognize excellence and vision and leadership in a woman.  That we insist that only shouty old white men have what it takes to be President is embarrassing and tragic.

In November, I will be voting for the Democratic nominee.  This has never been in doubt.  Politics is a team sport, and I will support my team.  In this verkakte primary, however, I will not give my support to either of the decrepit blowhards left in the race.  My vote goes to the only adult on the ballot, in lamentation of how stupidly we have let misogyny hobble us.

Happy International Women's Day.