"Why do you dislike Clinton so much?" you ask. "After all, her positions aren't all that different from Obama's, and you seem to tolerate HIM." That's a valid question, imaginary interlocutor. Let me try to answer it. Leave aside the fact that
she would endorses McCain over Obama. Leave aside the fact that she's
making ads for him. Sure, it's quite apparent that she would rather
destroy the entire party than see Obama win, but hey! This would be enough to earn my animosity anyway, but it's more than just dirty politics.
Actually, all that
is important, because it shows how utterly unprincipled she and her advisers--people who would be in her cabinet if she won the presidency-- are. Remember
this?"Superdelegates are not second-class delegates," says Joel Ferguson, who will be a superdelegate if Michigan is seated. "The real second-class delegates are the delegates that are picked in red-state caucuses that are never going to vote Democratic."
Hear that, red-staters?
Don't vote for Hillary. She doesn't want your support. Who cares what
you think? And that's really what it comes down to. Look, I know damn well that Barack Obama is not the messiah. He's not going to magically fix everything. And he's well to the right of me politically. But I do believe, naively or not, that he has a chance to fundamentally change the political dynamics of this country. He isn't just writing off red states, that's for sure. If Clinton were to win in the general--a big fucking if--it would be more of this same old tired, strategic, 50%+1. She would have no coattail effect; she sure as hell wouldn't help red states turn that little bit more purple--why
should she, when her campaign explicitly rejects their support? She doesn't
care about the rest of the party; all Clinton cares about is Clinton. Should she be elected, nothing will change. The country will remain as bitterly polarized as ever in the exact same way, and there won't be a thing in the world to stop another W getting elected in four or eight years.
I expect to be disappointed by Barack Obama. I'm not
that naive. I'm fully prepared for him to do things that piss me off. But I do believe that it won't
just be politics as usual; that we really
will experience some of that over-evoked quality known as "change." Maybe I'm wrong; maybe it'll all turn out to have been a grand illusion, and it'll end up being the same old thing. But I
know that will be the case with Clinton, so it's not much of a choice.
And you know, I
say I'll never vote for her now, but if it comes down to it (heaven forfend), yeah, I may chicken out. I know damn well that, in spite of everything, she wouldn't be as bad as McCain. But I'll tell you this: I have
never been faced with the prospect of voting for someone I viscerally loathe as much as I do Clinton. I've never voted for anyone I viscerally loathed, period. If I end up voting for her, win or lose, I
know that I'll end up feeling really, really bad about my vote. I know fulfilling one's civic responsibility isn't always fun, but is it
really supposed to nauseate you? Is that what we've come down to? Regardless of what I'd do, I'd have a hard time condemning anyone who just decided to sit the election out. 'Cause this whole thing is just
bullshit.
