Elections Past and Present

My periodic plea to elect more Democrats. Democracy depends on it.

The first year I could vote was 1972. I voted for a wide range of Democrats (McGovern, the marvelous Bill Roy, and peace activist James Juhnke), Republicans (whoever ran against Vern Miller and Johnny Darr), and third-party candidates when nothing better presented itself. None of those I voted for won, and I didn't vote again until 1996, when I couldn't resist the chance to once again vote against Bob Dole — who narrowly defeated Roy in 1972 in what remains for me the most scurrilous campaign I've ever experienced, and a bellweather for the Republican flip on abortion rights. It's not that I didn't follow politics. In the late 1960s, I could rattle off the name of every senator in the 20th century, and virtually everyone in the House; like Kevin Phillips, I had studied county presidential returns in the World Almanac, and could point to odd pockets of Republicans in the south (e.g., Baxter County in Arkansas, where my mother hailed from) and Democrats in the midwest (e.g., Ellis County in Kansas, but Phillips knew more than me, attributing this to the concentration of German immigrants, a degree of ethnic consciousness that had escaped my upbringing).

I had become radicalized in the late 1960s, although I harbored some hope for the McCarthy and McGovern campaigns. I continued to follow politics during my quiescent years, and had vaguer hopes, quickly dashed, for Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. Since 1996, I have continued to vote, to little effect in Kansas. I voted for Nader in 2000, but in a runoff I would have swallowed hard and voted for Gore vs. Bush. But Gore pretty deliberately decided not to campaign for my vote: his Kansas campaign was totally invisible (so much so that I imagined Nader might outpoll him here; Gore beat Nader about 5-to-1, which convinced me that any progressive change is going to have to go through the Democratic Party), and on issue he took pains to distance himself from anything leftish, going so far as to pick neocon Israel stooge Joe Lieberman as his running mate. One of the first things I posted on my website, way before my blogging days, was this relatively disinterested account (and still, I think, very interesting; one thing I would add now is that Gore had a much happier life losing than Bush did winning: he dumped Tipper, became a banker and made a lot of money, got reinterested in climate change — why didn't he make an issue of that in 2000? — and produced a successful movie, won a Nobel Prize).

Even having read Molly Ivins, I was somewhat naïve about Bush, but that was dispelled pretty quickly, even before 9/11 (he had, immediately after inauguration, aped Clinton in bombing Iraq). By 2004, I was livid enough to write a letter I circulated to everyone in my address book: Vote for John Kerry (It's Important). The more Kerry campaigned, the less I liked him, but the importance of ousting Bush was undiminished. Just to pick one trivial item, his goose hunting photo op was as bad as Dukakis in the tank. But I've softened a bit on him since we've had the opportunity to compare his term as Secretary of State with Hillary Clinton's. While far from perfect, Obama's foreign policy accomplishments (notably Iran and Cuba) virtually all came during Kerry's term. On the other hand, his debunking of the Nobel Peace Prize, his surge in Afghanistan, his embrace of Israel's practice of "targeted assassinations," his China-baiting "pivot to Asia," and the provocative expansion of NATO all occurred with Clinton.

I must have written more pre-election pleas, but those two stand out in my memory. But I also found this one from 2024: Top 10 Reasons to Vote for Harris vs. Trump. They're relevant here, because all 10 focus on Trump — I deal a bit with Harris in the final section, "Top 5 Reasons Electing Harris Won't Solve Our Problems," but even there the focus is more on the problems than on Harris. I probably made a more positive case for her elsewhere, but it takes more than understanding and concern — traits which she had much more than Trump — to get things done, especially in a system so corrupted by money. (I did describe her as "perceptive, analytical, and pragmatic," which is true for most Democrats, and vanishingly rare for Republicans these days.)

Allow me to synopsize my ten reasons here (bits in brackets are afterthoughts):

10. Donald Trump is a truly odious human being.

9. Such personal failings drive most people to despair, but Trump's inherited wealth has provided him with an armor of callousness. His narcissism has left him singularly unprepared to deal with reality when it so rudely intrudes on his fantasy life.

8. Trump's wealth, even as it seems, should be reason enough to disqualify him. His inability, or unwillingness, to disentangle his business interests is one reason. His inability to relate to ordinary Americans is another.

7. Aside from his abuse of executive power to staff government with corporate agents, pack the courts with right-wing cronies, and pardon numerous criminals, his record for delivering on his 2016 campaign promises is remarkably thin. Remember infrastructure? Or "draining the swamp"?

6. On the other hand, if Trump were more dedicated to the policy positions he espouses, or given more power by a Republican Congress [and Courts], he could (and probably would) do much more harm in a second term. Give him more power, and he will only grow more monstrous.

5. Donald Trump is a shit stain on the face of America. He is the first US president to give up all pretense of caring what other people think. His is a recipe for neverending war, as we've already seen with Russia and Iran, and [will soon enough see in the streets of America].

4. As bad as Trump is personally, the real danger is that his election will bring a tidal wave of Republicans into power throughout the federal and local governments they have pledged to debilitate and reduce, as Grover Norquist put it, "to the size where I can drown it in the bathtub." Trump has added his own authoritarian quirks to the Republican agenda, but the big risk to democracy has always come from money, which Republicans have made sure selects candidates and drives elections.

3. Two important concepts in economics are externality (public costs that are not factored into product costs, such as pollution) and opportunity costs (other things that we could spend money on if we weren't preoccupied with given expenses). Climate change is a good example of both. [But I should have focused more on war, inequality, and injustice.]

2. It's impossible to overstate how completely Donald Trump has taken over and perverted our culture, what philosophers call our noosphere — the mental universe, our ability to reason. I have no doubt that the bad policies advanced by Trump will blow up and wind up discredited, but at a great waste of effort to stop them, and a huge opportunity cost as we ignore constructive ideas from the left.

1. It's time to turn the page on Trump and the era of Fox Republicanism. Cloture on Trump is easy to imagine, as he's way past his prime, increasingly doddering at 78, unlikely to ever run again. Vote him out, and that's one problem America will never have to deal with again.

Part of the thinking behind that last pitch was my theory that the one good thing that came from Trump's win in 2016 is that we'd never have to deal with the Clintons again. While Bill Clinton was a fairly popular president, much of what he did has left a bitter taste, and not just the mostly manufactured scandals: NAFTA hollowed out the industrial base while stimulating massive immigration from Mexico; financial deregulation led to the slumps in 2001 and 2008; he made lots of rich people richer, and they in turn made him unseemly rich, increasing inequality for his personal benefit; and his opportunistic bombing of Iraq set the stage for Bush's forever wars. Plus, nepotism always stinks. And that Hillary stuck with him after all the lying, philandering, and grift, doesn't speak well of her own character. Trump was largely still a novelty in 2016, but by 2024 most people should have been even more sick and tired of him than they were of the Clintons.

Trump's not literally on the ballot this November, so the more personal traits shouldn't matter so much, but there's very little practical difference between Trump and nearly all of the Republicans running this year. And the slobbering affection many Republicans have for Trump is hard to ignore. The equivalence between Trump and his party has been cemented partly because he's very effectively purged most Republicans who questioned his policies or even his style. And also because much more than ever before, Congress has become little more than a side show, rubber-stamping presidential directives, or failing that simply being ineffectual. The only sure thing that continuing Republican control of Congress means is that Trump will have even more arbitrary authority to abuse and monetize.

Flipping Congress to give the Democrats thin majorities will set up the potential for some checks and balances, but not much. They could use their budget power to shift priorities, but the Courts have allowed Trump extraordinary (and previously unconstitutional) power to refuse or reallocate distributions. The Senate could put some limits on Trump's worst appointments, especially for judges, but Trump can fill in acting administrators pretty much at will. Congress can investigate and subpoena, but that did little good during the first Trump term.

The main thing flipping Congress will do is to keep Trump and the Republicans from cementing their policies in law, like they did with their so-called Big Beautiful Bill. It should also prepare Democrats better for fighting for the presidency in 2028, although it could also benefit Republicans by allowing them to shift blame for their many failures onto an uncooperative Congress. Republicans have little clue how to govern, but their one core competency is blaming others for their own failures.

So the bottom line here is that I strongly advise you to vote on (or before) Tuesday, November 3, and to vote for Democrats any chance you get, even if you have doubts. (Some of us always do.) Voting is not a major commitment. It's literally the least you can do while still doing something. It is an act of solidarity, not so much with the politicians as with the other voters you're depending on to save us from further disaster. In the long run, we'll need not just more Democrats but better ones. But for now, quantity matters. Hopefully at least we'll get people we can talk to, who share at least some minimal values of social responsibility and human decency. Who respect us, because they have faith in democracy.