I’m not a big fan of discussing politics for a number of reasons. The main reason is that usually when you’re having a political discussion, either you have the same viewpoints and everything’s hunky-dory or you don’t have the same viewpoints and end up arguing. And the argument ends up with everybody going home unhappy because political beliefs are something that people get weirdly entrenched upon. If a pro-choice and pro-life person start talking about abortion, it is highly unlikely that the pro-life person is suddenly going to go “Oh, you raise a great point that makes me question my whole world view, why yes I’m pro-choice now!” Or vice versa. I’m not saying it doesn’t happen, but most political debates I’ve seen are fruitless.
This could also spawn from the fact that I’m not an argumentative person by nature in the first place. I’m very laid-back and don’t really care for debating the finer points of, well, anything. The only time I’ll step into an argument is if one of the opinions being held is harmful in nature – as far as I’m concerned if you have an opinion and that opinion isn’t hurting anyone, more power to you. But if your opinion is, for example, women don’t deserve the right to choose what to do with their own bodies – I’ll be ready to get into an argument about that. However, there’s only so many times I’ll beat my head against a brick wall before I give up – after all, you can’t save all people from bigotry no matter how badly you want to.
I’m getting a little off-topic. Back to the point: Super Tuesday just passed, and while I’m not big on politics this is the first year I was galvanized into voting in the presidential primary. So I figure now is a good time as ever to briefly wade into political discourse about the upcoming 2016 presidential election.
Brief history – I consider myself an independent. I believe there’s a two party system for a reason – shifting too heavy leaning one way or the other goes into radicalism and radicals are annoying. My presidential voting track record is Dubya/Obama/Obama. (I’m 3 for 3!) In 2004, I felt John Kerry was too wishy-washy and didn’t have a firm stance on anything and didn’t trust him to be a good president. In 2008, I felt McCain was too much of a continuation of Bush, and after 8 years of W I believed the country needed a Democratic president to balance things out. In 2012, I felt if Romney was elected we would reverse on a lot of the social policies Obama had instated (and I agreed with) and in general was happy with how Obama was running things and didn’t see the need for a change in party leadership.
In 2016, I’m going to be voting Democrat for certain – primarily for the reason that I don’t feel like rewarding Republican politicians for their absurd obstructionist behavior over the past eight years. The goal of the Republican party since Obama took office has been “stop Obama from getting anything done at all costs.” Bipartisanship has gone out the window, to the point that it was a “scandal” for Chris Christie to hug Obama when the President visited New Jersey amid a crisis. Ted Cruz’s campaign’s idea of burying Rubio? They photoshopped a picture of Rubio shaking hands with Obama – because Lord knows being cordial with the President of the United States isn’t something people should be allowed to do without being reprimanded.
The House and Senate wasted their time passing a bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act, a bill they knew would be vetoed by the President, just to “prove a point.” They put the government into shutdown instead of passing proper funding. This insane idea of not letting Obama pick a replacement for Scalia and stalling for a whole YEAR is off the deep end. And most of the Republicans are running on the idea of “fixing” what Obama has done to the country. I don’t want to go backward as a country. Show me a Republican who accepts Obama’s tenure as President and puts forth new ideas for moving the country forward instead of running on a platform of “I’ll undo anything Obama has done!” and I’ll consider that person as a potential President.
It’s a testament to just how fucked up the Republican party has gotten when they’re literally considering obstructing their own voter base to get what they want – as the idea is apparently being floated to simply not let Trump get the majority of delegates so they can block him out at the Convention and get who they want into the nomination. Do they not understand how democracy works? The country got to the point where a large portion of people want to elect a reality TV host who files for bankrupcy once a year into the most important office in the United States. And yet all the people with money and talking points on their teleprompters want to act like they can just usurp what the people want. Except then you’re literally spitting into the face of democracy.
I hate Trump. I think we’re in for a world of hurt if he gets elected. But if the Republican base has gotten so radicalized and so racist that Trumpmania puts him as the primary candidate for electing? That’s what the people want. That’s the point of these primaries. If a group of people with lots of money shuck the will of the people and throw the person they want in charge into the fray – that’s not democracy. That’s a captialist oligarchy.
My biggest worry (outside of Drumpf winning the general election) is that the obstructionist policies are going to continue into the next presidency if a Democrat is elected. I mean, fuck. If a bunch of old white dudes threw this kind of fit when the first black President was in office, just think what they’ll do when the first woman President is there. Some of the men in the House/Senate probably haven’t taken orders from a woman in their entire life. How many temper tantrums are going to be thrown if Hilary pushes a pro-women health care bill through Congress that is pro-choice and gives women mandatory paid maternity leave (like a good chunk of the rest of the world already has)? Are we going to see Republicans filibustering the idea of equal pay between the sexes? How far could it go?
2016 has been a hell of a year so far in the political world. Every time Trump does something stupid and yet still retains his popularity I scratch my head and wonder how. A guy who has been blatantly racist and sexist, who is purposefully inflammatory and either dismisses or insults everyone who criticizes him, is somehow is a frontrunner to run the country. To negotiate with other countries about important shit like nuclear disarmament.
And yet I’m not surprised. In a world where social media is king, where news reports have to update you every five minutes on nothing or risk not being the first media outlet to report about nothing, where internet trolling is commonplace and unpunished – it makes sense that Trump is winning. He’s touched a base that felt like the establishment was ignoring them and then used knowledge of the post-internet world to gain power. But even Cruz and Rubio aren’t great alternatives either – one’s just a big a sleazeball as Trump and the other’s a malfunctioning robot.
No, I’m voting Democrat this year for certain. And if Trump wins, well…I hear Vancouver’s nice.
Warning! Opinions Ahead 