Oh stop talking about Perot already
In reference to my post about giving Bush the heave ho, I’ve gotten some comments telling me that I shouldn’t do it. AlphaPatriot opines:
Yeah, the conservatives of the country got pissed off at Bush the Elder and sent a clear message to the Republican Party in 1992 by voting for Ross Perot. As a consequence we suffered the indignity of eight years of Clinton.
How did that “clear signal” work out for y’all?
Well, Bush 2 talked the right talk, which is a sign they got the message. He did, however, fail to walk the walk, which is another sign that the Republicans don’t care about the personal freedom loving, small government, responsibility taking wing of the Republican (libertarian) fringe. But, the loyalists argue, it’s reasonable since we suffered through 9/11. That is crap.
Kevin opines in comments:
I’d like to remind you that the elephant is the Republican party symbol – it does not mean that politicians who call themselves Republicans have much of a memory. Please bear in mind that when many, many of us voted ‘in protest’ for Ross Perot it didn’t get us four years of Bubba, but eight – and it very, very nearly got us four more years of Gore.
And THAT didn’t get Republican ‘back on track,’ now did it?
Go ahead, vote Libertarian or don’t vote at all, but don’t think it’s going to change the behavior of the Republican Party. They’re too disconnected from reality for it to affect them.
Yes, it got us Clinton but the message was sent to Republicans, who apparently lack comprehension. It temporarily got them back on track they just failed to follow through. They continue to do so.
Both AlphaPatriot and Kevin admit to the failure of the Republican party but insist on voting against Democrats. That is more important to some folks but not me. I would rather run screaming at the pending governmental failure than ease into it. Get it over with, instead of prolonging it. If you charge it, it has to respond. If you allow it to happen gradually, you can’t stop it.
It is truly a sad state of affairs when people like Kevin and AlphaPatriot have to vote against someone and not for them.
October 20th, 2003 at 1:51 pm
The Dems and Repubs really are two wings of a single party — a party of personal privilege, wealth and power. All the “issues” talk is just pro-forma ritual. Dems aren’t really interested in personal rights and Pubs aren’t really interested in smaller government. All government is scam.
Today’s paper noted that since 1974, *not one* incumbent has been defeated in re-election in Tennessee’s House of Representatives. That’s terrible.
Me, I think the Reform Party is like Zion in Matrix Reloaded: a planned outlet for protest energy that’s part of the whole scam. It served its purpose and was destroyed. The Matrix survives.
October 20th, 2003 at 6:27 pm
So if I understand you correctly, you will vote for a greater evil because the lesser evil pissed you off for being so evil (though not as evil as the greater evil), even knowing that you will have no real impact evilness of the lesser evil. Correct?
First of all, let me say that if you want to vote for a candidate that agrees with your position on everything, you’d better run for office.
Second, I highly recommend Eugene Volokh’s post, Why I’m a Party Line Voter.
For a personal anecdote on why I won’t vote Democrat except where I know the voting history of the candidate, see my post Voting the Party Line.
However, I will say that if you ever run for office you will almost certainly have my vote.
October 20th, 2003 at 7:42 pm
Perhaps a better strategy would be to actually show up at primaries and caucuses, where the important work really gets done. Both major parties have lost touch with huge sections of their voting base, and the only way to fix this is for the rank-and-file of the party to oust the current party leadership. And by “party leadership,” I don’t mean the elected officials, but rather the DLC and its Republican equivalent, whatever that may be.
October 20th, 2003 at 7:45 pm
Mike:
The Dems and Repubs really are two wings of a single party — a party of personal privilege, wealth and power. All the “issues” talk is just pro-forma ritual.
That’s a dangerous error in judgement. Because if you care about issues like abortion, the environment, gun rights, and tax cuts, which party you vote for makes a substantial difference.
October 20th, 2003 at 10:08 pm
I’m not voting for the greater evil. I view dean as the least evil of the democrats. If bush loses (which i don’t think he will, i’d bet a beer on it), i’d rather have dean than the other dems.
October 20th, 2003 at 11:48 pm
(For some reason my earlier attempt to respond failed.)
“It is truly a sad state of affairs when people like Kevin and AlphaPatriot have to vote against someone and not for them.”
I haven’t voted for anyone since Reagan (1st term). Come to think of it, that’s the ONLY time I ever voted for a candidate.
Let me be perfectly clear: I think that anybody who runs for high State or any Federal office should be immediately disqualified for wanting it. H.L. Mencken wrote “The government consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. They have, taking one with another, no special talent for the business of government; they have only a talent for getting and holding office. Their principal device to that end is to search out groups who pant and pine for something they can’t get and to promise to give it to them. Nine times out of ten that promise is worth nothing. The tenth time is made good by looting A to satisfy B. In other words, government is a broker in pillage, and every election is sort of an advance auction sale of stolen goods.”
I think Mencken was an optimist.
October 21st, 2003 at 11:19 am
However, I will say that if you ever run for office you will almost certainly have my vote.
Even if i’m not on the republican ticket? :^)
October 21st, 2003 at 11:55 am
Kevin:
Not far off from Groucho Marx’s assertion that “I don’t care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members.”
October 21st, 2003 at 9:52 pm
Even if i’m not on the republican ticket?
As long as you’re not on the Green ticket.
October 21st, 2003 at 11:19 pm
tgirsch:
Not quite the same. It is my belief that people who run for small local office may actually have honest, altruistic reasons for it, and may actually do a good job. But by the time you reach significant public office, you must have been suborned by the Party system or you stand no chance of getting elected (unless you’re independently famous, and that’s not a guarantee.)
So, it’s not so much a matter of not being willing to “belong to a club that accepts people like me as members”, but not being willing to belong to a club that makes politicians what they must be to get elected. Politics is a corrupt and corrupting business. Yet these people write our laws. (And write them, and write them, and write them….)