I am, as many are, distressed with the way the campaign
season is going. I have spent too much of my life indifferent to candidates. I
started putting mild efforts into learning about candidates in my thirties. Now
that Douglas is in the Foreign Service and I’m around more conversations
regarding politics, I’ve upped my efforts.
I wrote a blog years ago about how my (your) vote doesn’t
make any difference. Some were upset with me. I’m glad they let me know it. We
need to learn how to disagree with each other respectfully. With that in mind .
. .
In one corner, we have the “Never Hillary” people and, in
the far opposite corner (much like our Senate) the “Anyone but Trump” people.
Just out of curiosity, I looked up how many choices in
toilet paper we have on average when we go to the store. (It’s one of those
days. It’s rainy. I’ve ironed about 20 of Douglas’s shirts, I’m into the
pudding cups and it’s not yet noon.) So I figure we have about twenty choices
when we go to the store.
WARNING: I’m about to say, rather write, something crude.
I want to know why we have roughly twenty choices sitting in
plain sight on the shelves, advertised, marketed and tested by Good
Housekeeping magazine (http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/health-products/toilet-paper-reviews/)
twenty choices of paper to wipe our
asses with and only two promoted choices to vote for in the presidential
election.
Furthermore, when Pepsi, say, comes out with a new product
people are onto it. They may disparage it, they may rave about it, but it’s out
there and talked about. Same for movies, Beyoncé’s newest release, the latest app for the I-Phone, (quoth the
King of Siam) etcet-e-ra, etcet-e-ra, etcet-e-ra.
There are other candidates, namely Gary Johnson and Jill
Stein.* Why are they kept out of
mainstream media? (I’ve heard Gary Johnson twice on Public Radio.) Who decides
this and why do we stand for it? Are we actually content in ignorance?
Many people aren’t even aware that they have other choices.
Many are afraid they’ll throw the election if they vote for anyone other than
Mrs. Clinton or Mr. Trump. I’ve already been hit with this spoiler argument
twice. Although I understand it mathematically, to me it’s akin to calling a
police or FBI informant a snitch. Anyone who is willing to step outside their
political party when casting a vote ought to be able to at least seriously
consider voting for a third party candidate.
I poked around a little and found 7 recognized political
parties (down from 16 in 2014). In the United Kingdom there are 16 major
parties and 24 minor parties. In Canada there are currently 24 including the
Rhinoceros Party, the Marijuana Party and the Pirate Party. The United States
has five major political parties, though one would never know this from our
media: Democratic, Republican, Libertarian, Green and Constitution. Parties
with state representation include Republican, Democrat, Vermont Pregressive,
Libertarian, Working Families, Conservative Party of New York State,
Independence party of New York and Independent. We have thirty minor parties
including our own Marijuana Party – one I’ve not yet been invited to. We also
have an Objectivist Party (based on the philosophy of Ayn Rand) which puts
“rational egoism” before altruism.
I am becoming one of the many voters who will be voting against someone more so than for someone. It is unconscionable to me
to put Donald Trump in the office of President. He’s too offensive and too
limited in his world political knowledge. He seems too egotistical to me to
take advice. Hillary Clinton has lied to us. I don’t say what I’m about to say to dismiss this: what
presidential candidate has not lied to us? Until we figure out how to ban
together and say no to the lot of those who lie, we are stuck with one who
does. Just like we are stuck with a congress that only sometimes does its job.
Hillary Clinton’s world experience as our Secretary of State is valuable. I see
how Donald Trump’s business experience is valuable to the office – I remember
being torn between Bill Clinton and Ross Perot in 1992 until I saw the
Vice-Presidential debates with James Stockdale. I remember Ross Perot saying
he’d take the office without pay; I wonder if Donald Trump would be willing to
do that. Why should he, you may ask? As he so often reminds us, he’s quite
wealthy already. So wealthy that he considers what his father gave him decades
ago (anywhere from a million to several million dollars, depending on which
story you believe) a “small loan.”
A recent quote of Donald Trump: “you’ve got to get every one
of your friends, you’ve got to get every one of your family you’ve got to get
everybody to go out and watch. And go out and vote. And when I say ‘watch,’ you
know what I’m talking about, right? Yu know what I’m talking about You’ve got
to go out and you’ve got to watch.” Encouraging intimidation at the very least,
violence and oppression the worst. He has already encouraged violence against
Americans when he was telling an audience that if Hillary Clinton gets to pick
her judges there was nothing they could do. He was telling them that they were
powerless. He then slightly back-pedaled by saying, “Although, the second amendment
people, maybe there is. I don’t know.” How anyone can see him as presidential I
don’t know.
I am bracing myself for the possibility of a Trump
presidency. It could oddly work in our favor. We are hoping to be posted in
Russia next. Donald Trump admires Putin; keeping that enormous ego stroked
could make Americans look better in their eyes. Maybe if I collect some Trump paraphernalia
and scatter around our apartment, when they have their go-through, they’ll see
us as harmless. I don’t know.
We may need Donald Trump as our president. Troubled people
often need to hit rock bottom before they acknowledge their need for help. Our
country has quite an ego. My past complaints about our government have been met
with the trite assurance that we have the best government. I’ve now lived in
Uzbekistan and Germany. I agree our government is better than Uzbekistan’s, but
I’m not so sure it’s better than Germany’s. I’d need to know more. The gun
violence in our country is out of hand and vehemently protected by a congress
that is, in great part, reelected and reelected. Our debt is far greater than
it needs to be. Our entertainment is laced with ‘reality’ and talk shows that
pit people against each other telling the most sordid stories and hurling vulgar
insults. Garbage in; garbage out, folks.
I don’t think ours is the only country with these problems;
I know it’s not. It would just be nice to be a step above those countries that
overspend while in debt, level extreme punishments on mild crimes and lock away
criminals punitively rather than as rehabilitation. It would be nice to be
around people who seek truth rather than clinging to their opinions and
surrounding themselves with like-minded individuals. I don’t see those things
happening with Donald Trump in the president’s seat, but it hasn’t been
happening under anyone else’s leadership because it must happen within each
individual. It’s something that cannot be imposed. It can be demonstrated, but
then it must be followed, mirrored without the distraction of a difference of
political party or religion.
*I found other supposed candidates. Ricky De La Fuente and
John Wolfe – I found no website for either. Then there is Keith Russel Judd who
needs his own sentence. He is a self-proclaimed Rasta-Christian who claims to
have run in every presidential election since 1996 as well as for mayor of
Santa Fe and governor of New Mexico, has a criminal record that involves stuff
too gross to get into (I may have outdone myself in paragraph number six) and
he claims to be a former member of The Federation of Super Heroes. Okay, then.
