This morning, we’re asked a question:
Are you all glad you voted for Barack Obama now?
That’s a good question, and it deserves more of an answer than a “Yes” or a “No.” It deserves an explanation, and by way of explaining I’ll give my answer to a few questions that this question is not, but might seem to be, asking.
Am I happy with Barack Obama’s record in office? With a few exceptions, no. Barack Obama has continued the Bush administration’s program of expansive domestic warrantless surveillance. Barack Obama supports Patriot Act reauthorization and an expansive view of executive power that makes government less accountable to the people. Barack Obama has continued the Bush administration’s poor environmental record when it comes to offshore drilling, clean coal and endangered species protection. Barack Obama directed big bailouts to bankers and wealthy investors, but sent scant relief to Americans struggling to get by. Barack Obama took the banner of “health care reform” and turned it into a mandate that people buy health insurance without provision for an affordable public option. I do not support these actions carried out by Barack Obama. I am opposed to the Obama policy agenda.
Do I support the re-election of Barack Obama in 2012? In the abstract, no. I would either like to see a more solid liberal with strong experience like Russell Feingold or Dick Durbin run for President in a successful Democratic Party primary campaign, or see a third party candidacy featuring a liberal challenge to Barack Obama in 2012. I would actively support such a challenge in practice. But I don’t expect to see the combination of a candidate with strong experience and a solid liberal record challenging Barack Obama from either inside the Democratic Party or from the outside as a third party challenger. In lieu of that, I think the 2012 presidential election will need to be a season in which liberals keep the pressure up on Barack Obama.
Will I cast my vote for Barack Obama in 2012? To be honest, I’m not sure. There are two reasonable approaches to voting. One approach is to help the better of the two most viable candidates win, and frankly I expect Barack Obama to be a poor candidate but still better than any Republican alternative. Taking that approach, I would barring unforseen developments cast my vote for Barack Obama again in 2012. Another reasonable approach is to use a vote as a voice, an expression of support for the best model of leadership among all candidates, not simply between the two who are most viable. Taking that approach, I might vote for a Green or independent candidate for president if they presented a strong liberal policy platform and a strong personal record of leadership.
But these are different questions from the question we are asked this morning, Are you all glad you voted for Barack Obama now? Speaking for myself, I have to say yes. Independent candidate Ralph Nader had a good policy platform but represented a disastrous personal capacity for leadership. He has no executive experience, he has never held elective office and has never participated in government in a leadership capacity. His stellar lifetime record is a record as a critic, and a president is not a critic. If he won the presidency, I firmly believe the result would have been discord and disaster. In 2008, he couldn’t even manage to form an alliance with the Green Party.
If John McCain and Sarah Palin had won election, they would have done much worse than Barack Obama. Sarah Palin might have relieved us by resigning from the Vice Presidency, but can you imagine what she’d be up to by now if she’d stayed in office? John McCain is only getting older and more frail, and Sarah Palin is not fit to be President. In the meantime, while John McCain may have the experience and personal ability to lead, I find his regressive policy priorities to be repugnant.
So yes, I am still glad I voted for Barack Obama. I oppose his record in office. I’d rather see someone else in the White House after 2012. I firmly believe that these three statements are compatible.
What’s your take?
i voted third party for years, it didn’t even matter much which third party, just to show my disapproval of the status-quo. low and behold, we, in minnesota, got a third party elected to the governorship with mixed results. i still stand by my vote in that election. i feel ventura got hi-jacked by both democrats and republicans and then his own policies never quite formulated into anything substantial, still, it sent a strong message.
when i voted third party in the 2000 election, however, i think i may have made a mistake. when it comes down so close that a few votes do decide elections, then the lesser of evils needs to be considered. fortunately, for my conscience, the vote in minnesota did not put bush/cheney in office. and i definetly voted democrat in ’04.
with obama, i was in no way voting for the less of two evils. i honestly believe in his motives and ability. the fact that he has such a huge task, complicated by such a huge opposition, does not dissuade me from my original impression. hope springs eternal, but, change takes time. so, the campaign slogan can still ring true, even if it takes us into the 2012 election.
Here a video of what “our” next generation really thinks of the present administrations budget and deficits.
http://www.youtube.com/user/Optoons#p/u/4/Jf4QRs5THA4
Well put.
If John McCain and Sarah Palin had won election, they would have done much worse than Barack Obama.
No way. Palin would have been told to shut up and smile, and she would have complied. McCain weaves on bothsides of center that he would have either pissed off or made happy bothsides of the isle equally. And most of all, the congress would have kept his “Radical” agenda in check. But with Obama, congress rolled over to let his incompetance run amok and now we pay the price. Just dump the Progressive supriority bullshit for once and look at abilities. You can’t seriously tell me that McCain would have not crossed the isle and worked with progressives far more than Obama has? And to say that the trainwreck called the Obama Presidency is better than any republican canidate is cleartly showing they would rather see this nation in flames than try to work it out. You would be no different than a Bush supporter in 2004.
I agree with you, and instead of losing 10 senate seats in 2010, you would be getting a few more most likely. McCain would have been inept, and he is not a conservative. I told Jim this before the election, but he didn’t seem to believe me.
McCain is a militarist though so he may have attacked something or boosted defense spending more. But since he is viewed as trigger happy, maybe he would have tried to address his weaknesses rather than do something crazy. Hard to say.
QS,
I still don’t believe you when you say McCain is not a conservative. He is not a Trent Franks conservative, but he is still a conservative. In January 2009, he voted against the right of women to sue corporations for pay discrimination if corporations can hide that discrimination for the first six months. That’s conservative. In February 2008, he voted for the FISA Amendments Act to unleash warrantless surveillance upon the American people. That’s conservative. He voted to reauthorize the Patriot Act. That’s conservative. He voted to put a military chief responsible for our current data mining system, Michael Hayden, in charge of civilian intelligence that has gone data-mining crazy. That’s conservative. He voted for John Roberts for Chief Justice. That’s conservative. He voted for Samuel Alito for Justice. That’s conservative. He voted for War-on-the-Constitution Alberto Gonzalez as Attorney General. That’s conservative. He voted to make it harder for working Americans to declare bankruptcy. That’s conservative. He opposes 14th Amendment equal protection under law for gay and lesbian Americans. That’s conservative. I could go on for many paragraphs more. If John McCain isn’t conservative, I’m a monkey’s uncle.
Ya, I prefer third party candidates to run within the republican or democrat party in general.
That’s what Ron Paul does, and it’s much more effective than running as a libertarian or something because this way he has legitimacy. This is because if he was to win the GOP primary, people know that he would gain full control of the party machinery instead of just being noise on the sideline to be ignored.