As I said I would, I voted for Sen. Obama today. I don’t feel better about the world. I’m not relieved that change is on the way. My teeth aren’t straighter. My hair isn’t shinier. I didn’t win the lottery. Is that because I don’t believe enough?
For what it’s worth, I’m standing by my refusal to vote for either party’s candidate in November. Having already judged Sen. Obama the least problematic, relatively speaking, I’ll ignore Senators McCain and Clinton until another day. But this misguided enthusiasm for Obama because of his promises of help with college tuition from a voter¹ looking for a vending machine candidate and Radley Balko’s concise rebuttal of the stupidity of such an offer sum up my antipathy to registering a general election vote for even this least problematic candidate. Barring a stunning development or a good third party candidate (i.e. not Bloomberg), I’m voting for myself for president in November. I already have three votes lined up. Join the parade early. (I’d add often, but that’s the modus operandi of the two major parties.)
I’ll leave you with a scene from my voting experience today. When the woman in front of me walked to the check-in table when it was her turn, she countered any optimism I’m supposed to have about democracy (in the naked, majoritarian sense) with the following:
Volunteer: What’s your name?
Woman: <states name>
Volunteer: <after verifying name> Which primary would you like to vote in?
Woman: I don’t know.
Volunteer: You have to pick one.
Woman: What are the choices?
Volunteer: <pointing> There are the sample ballots.
Woman: <slowly reads the two ballots, then points> This one.
She chose the Republican ballot. I’m stereotyping guessing she voted for Huckabee because of his affiliation and his opposition to teh gay. That’s probably not fair, but I’m trying to gauge my world – my neighbors – with incomplete information. My theory fits my district, unfortunately.
Any dissenters from that theory, with only the limited information I gave?
¹ Via Andrew Sullivan.