I want to thank Howard Dean for a candidacy that began with courage, and now ends with grace.
I will be sitting out the rest of the primary season, but I look
forward to voting for the Democrat–Kerry or Edwards–in November.
There are things that I like about each, and things I dislike. There
were also things about Dean I didn’t like. And this is how elections
have to work–reasonable people finding the best available compromise
choice.
Throwing your vote away as a glorious gesture of protest because the
perfect candidate isn’t up there? It’s easy to make that sound
glamorous. There will be lots of people trying to make it sound good to
all of us.
If you care about what happens in the next four years, don’t let such people throw away your vote.
1 response so far ↓
1 fp // Feb 20, 2004 at 9:51 am
I hope that Howard and the Deaniacs make a live appearance at the convention. I hope that the issues of conscience that have been raised, and the practical platform matters won’t be thrown out as the two party process waters everything down to a vote of no confidence for Bush.
Dave Winer makes an important observation in a post this morning… Dave relates, “He repeated that the only thing that mattered was winning. It didn’t occur to me until this morning why that is wrong. Maybe it’s true from the candidate’s perspective, but it’s not true from the voter’s. What matters to the voter is getting representated. In the current political system that can’t happen. Think about it this way. What if, in 2000, your main issue had been No Nation Building. Easy. Vote for Bush. What does he do his first week in office? Gets ready to do some nation-building. Did he know he would invade Iraq when he was running? You be the judge. In any case, as with most centralized businesses, the voters are a herd, not meant to be heard.”
I’m hoping that Howard Dean will continue to gather delegates and represent our interests at the convention, thereby influencing the nominee to represent us throughout his/her term of office.