uninspired voting

i got an earful the other day from my very liberal brother about not voting for the best candidate in the democratic race. he then proceeded (in his well-trained debater/organizer way) to detail the reasons why his candidate was clearly the choice for america. despite feeling a little like the called-upon third-grader who hadn't studied the answers enough, i started to feel like he was right.

here's the thing. i wanted to vote for obama. i wanted to buy into the "be the change" mantra that he exudes. i like the way he speaks, and i like where he stands on issues. the problem is, up until recently, i liked those things about hillary, as well. and since i was so undecided, i took a whole slew of online surveys about the issues. without knowing who had responded how (a blind test, if you will), i selected the responses i agreed with the most. not terribly scientific, but i figured it was unbiased enough. the results of the online surveys were all the same-- hillary in first, edwards in second, and obama in third. having had trouble choosing in the first place, i found it hard to choose the one who came in third when i inspected responses to specific issues.

the other thing that swayed me away from obama was that so far, he's a lot of talk. what he says when he's talking sounds good, but there's not much of a track record to refer back to. if you ask my brother, that's a positive, because he's not marred by the corruption of washington dc politicking. i have a hard time with that, though, because i'd like to know that the leader of the country is actually doing the things s/he says s/he will do. (california got hit hard by the "big talk" when schwartzie was elected. i don't like that precedent.)

the difference now, as my brother points out (besides the petty ugliness that inevitably erupts when candidates can't get ahead on their own merit), is the manner in which each candidate has garnered support.

hillary: the big states with lots of delegates and most of the liberal bent.
obama: steady grassroots support in many of the states, including from constituents who typically would lean towards other parties.

hillary: delivering the states that would be delivered to the dems anyway (and not even solidly—most states split delegates in the primaries).
obama: unifying the country and getting all kinds of voters behind him. and frankly, if I’d thought about it, that’s really what this country needs.

It’s been way too divisive here for the past 7 years, and now is the time for us to step up and become a nation again. There used to be times in the history of this country where people were passionate about our leadership, our place in the world, and what we could do to stand up for our beliefs and our freedoms. We’ve gone too far away from that, and if Obama is the one to bring us back to that, then I’m all for it.

I guess when it comes down to it, I’ll probably have another chance in November to vote for him, unless of course hillary finds a way to pull it out. We’ll see how it goes… my brother says that if obama loses by one electoral vote, he’s blaming me.