I am dismayed to find friends already declaring that they won’t vote for Joe Biden in November. On Monday I voted for Joe Biden here in Illinois. I would have preferred to vote for Elizabeth Warren. But I waited to see what would happen on Super Tuesday, and after Warren brought her campaign to an end, I voted for the candidate who has (as I see it) the best chance of defeating the current occupant of the White House.
I know what it’s like to not want to vote for a candidate. That’s how I felt in 2016 about Hillary Clinton. But I voted for her in the general election, “utterly without enthusiasm,” as I wrote at the time. If Joe Biden becomes the Democratic nominee, I will vote for him with only the mildest enthusiasm. But enthusiasm or no enthusiasm, no one should imagine they have the luxury of not voting in 2020.
Here, for anyone who might find it persuasive, is most of a post I wrote in August 2016. The post title was Allegory:
The restaurant has a limited menu — very limited. There are, for practical purposes, just two dishes, A and B. If you order one of them, you will get it or the other dish. There are other dishes on the menu, but no chance of getting them. If you order one of these other dishes, you’ll get A or B, and you’ll have lost your chance to choose between the two (which, of course, might not have made a difference). There are no other restaurants. So you choose from what’s available: A or B.In 2016 the other dishes on the allegorical menu included the Green Party. In 2020 the allegory might be altered to include writing in your own choice of entree. But the real choice remains: A or B. In November that will almost certainly mean voting for Joe Biden.
Something else I wrote in August 2016, in a comment on a friend’s blog: “It’s good to know your own mind, but it’s good, too, to know that you can change it.”
comments: 3
(Putting aside whether trump is unfit. Also possibly putting aside the fact that this whole post is about the illusitory nature of the idea that we CAN "put aside" in these political choices...) Isn't Joe Biden massively unfit? Like, cognitively it seems clear to me (I'm not a doctor) that he is solidly into his "there will be Good Days and there will be Bad Days" stage. Which does not come to all people ", but comes to some and can be related to age and sometimes described using diseases names. I've been feeling (for some weeks, before the dropouts) that keeping him in the race is elder abuse. I thought the "Leg hair" story was just trail-folksiness missing the mark, etc, etc... But that whole "I'm running for congress, hey, check-me-out; see who I am..if...then vote for the Other Biden..." And that is not the only; I mean, he himself endorsed Trump; last week was it? I guess (too-liberal?) Bernie is a non-starter for the DNC??? So all the young'ns who don't want to tank their future party prospects toed the line and verbally passed to Joe? Apologies for the long rantish post, but if this (DNC machination I infer) is close to the truth, this is approaching the early-tea party era shenanigans that forced me off the republican rolls and had me changing my registration as a young voter.
Biden has always been prone to gaffes, and he has a lifelong problem with a stutter. I saw something very different from his debate flops in his (unrehearsed) response in South Carolina to the pastor whose wife was killed by that young racist. His (rehearsed) remarks today also showed a much more fluent speaker. As for endorsing Trump, look at all of what Biden said, as reported byNewsweek.
Again, all I care about now is the urgency of voting for the candidate who can beat Trump. Sanders’s failure with African American voters and the relatively low turnout among younger voters make me think that Biden is the right choice.
Thanks for the link; I'm going to look into those other situations you mentioned, too!
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