I was walking to somewhere in my neighborhood recently, or more accurately, coming home from having walked to somewhere in my neighborhood, when I saw a curious bumper sticker.
It was an old stationwagon, one that makes me think of the 80’s, though it is more likely from the 90’s. What kind? Well, sort of blue, I’d say. The house at whose curb it is parked is an unassuming and pleasant house, with a porch on which I never see people sit. Of course in this neighborhood they’re either fantastically wealthy (they have a house, after all), or they’ve lived here for a long time. I’m guessing the latter.
The bumpersticker appears to be a campaign bumpersticker. The normal type, some name, some slogan, some year. The year is 2008, and the slogan is “why vote for a lesser evil?”
And this is an interesting thought. Are we ever completely happy with our choices when it comes to elected officials? Or potentially elected officials? I don’t think I am. I might agree with them on certain issues, and be absolutely disappointed, sometimes to the point of disgust, with their stance on other issues. I’m tired of the two-party system, and I think many people would heartily welcome the ability to vote for someone on the basis of their merit, feeling like worthy candidates had a chance, that it was up to the entire body of citizens to have a say, and all that without being told that we were “throwing away our vote.”
As if voting for the “lesser evil” isn’t doing the same, really.
And so the bumper sticker caught my eye. I wasn’t sure, at first, whether it was a joke, or just a candidate I’d never heard of. I saw reference to the name a couple weeks later, as it happens, and that question was answered for me.
But was it really a joke? If it was, it was a thought-provoking one, at least for me. And perhaps that’s the point. A dark-humored joke that’s not quite as funny as it could have been, because it hits a bit too close to home.
Well there’s always the ability to write in our candidate of choice, after all.
unrelenting ambiguity 
December 31, 2007 at 4:14 pm
i voted for ralph nader, twice, because i refused to do the lesser evil thing. now everyone blames me and people like me for bush. but a vote for nader was a vote for nader, and if the other teams couldn’t come up with a person the voting public really believes in, then that’s where the blame lied.
December 31, 2007 at 6:09 pm
I don’t know ANYTHING abou politics because I don’t care to follow that circus of lying candidates. But that mythical creature sure is interesting!
December 31, 2007 at 6:09 pm
@ Mary – I blame the supreme court for bush, at least the first time!
I think it is a real problem that there are people who blame anyone for voting for the candidate they thought best suited. This is also an issue I have with our two-party system (if you can call the democrans and repoublicrats two different parties). It is pretty much indoctrinated in us that to vote for any but the either-or is a throw-away vote. This, of course, makes sure that it remains true, and of course there are those who don’t even realize that there are any but the either-or running.
And that’s also part of why the candidates are so unappealing to the masses – you can’t please everyone, but their attempts to seem to please no one, yet that’s who we’re left to choose from.
Of course there are a lot of other issues I have – the pay-per-vote system that the lobbying creates, along with the more than substantial donations that the large corporations make (usually to both sides, so they’ll own a piece of whoever gets into office), and are allowed to make. That’s a big pet peeve of mine as well. The cost of campaigns? Ridiculous.
Get rid of lobbyists, make it illegal for corporations to donate to politics, and set a dollar limit of like 10 bucks on campaign costs, and maybe we’d see honest campaigns and honest candidates. Well, more honest, anyway.
When people berate others for not voting at all, I don’t think they even understand how deep the cynicism runs, to be honest. It isn’t even that I think the current batch of cookie cutter candidates are piss poor, it is that I don’t think the best candidate in the world will change what looks like and smells like a corporate run government.
I’ll probably vote anyway, because I could be wrong. But of course I have to remember to register to vote, something I’m guilty of forgetting to do for more than one election.
@ Scott – yeah, I don’t think the system does much to foster honesty in politics. Some of it is spin, some of it is probably even acceptable compromise (or naive compromise) but since it always seems to be at the expense of the promises that had us voting for them to begin with, it doesn’t sit well! Still, you shouldn’t let yourself know nothing of politics. It’s what we have to work with at the moment, and knowledge is power.
January 1, 2008 at 2:49 pm
I have to be committed to the idea that the only way we’ll change things is if we remain in the system. Now, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t simultaneously work to change it. Yes, lobbying is despicable. Campaign contributions are so distorted and some are at the point where they should be criminal and the entire system needs to change. My vote is to vote your conscience while agitating for change. Because I currently live in South Florida, I’m particularly mortified about the 2000 election, and I recommend the documentary Unprecedented (http://www.unprecedented.org/) to everyone for the behind-the-music about what occurred (that we down here had to live through in real time, unfortunately).
If I lost hope that individuals could make a difference, I don’t know what I’d do.
January 1, 2008 at 4:26 pm
So is the message of that bumper sticker that you also have the choice to vote for pure evil instead of just settling for the lesser evil? It’s a neat bumper sticker, but I’m still thinking that I don’t quite get it. Thanks, Deb, for the interesting discussion, anyway.
January 1, 2008 at 5:53 pm
@ Mary – I’ll have to check out that documentary, thanks for linking it! If you lost hope for individuals’ ability to make change, you’d probably go through the motions of voting, yawning all the while, wondering while people make such a fuss, but participating just in case the unexpected happens. Or maybe that’s just me. 😉
@ FW – I think the message of the bumpersticker can be interpreted a couple different ways, and is purposefully ambiguous. (I love ambiguity for things like that.) So yes, instead of half-assing our votes, we should vote for either the greatest evil or the greatest good, right? Instead of voting for the “lesser evil” that does quite a bit of damage, regardless. That’s how I take it. Cthulhu, while originally a fictional character in its own right, has come to symbolize “the greatest evil”, if that helps.
Another way to look at it is that the only way to galvanize the masses into demanding change is if the circumstances of the majority (not just the poor) became so horrible that it was distinctly noticeable and worth risks to the middle class. You can see Argentina as an example of this type of dynamic (it was the bankruptcy of the middle class that led to the overthrow of 8 or so governments in two weeks 6 or so years back).
Some believe that some of the criteria are starting to be met for what would currently be considered radical change to be demanded by the majority. In other words, the middle class is starting to feel the bite – the heath care crisis has been affecting the middle class in growing numbers, and the mortgage crisis is as well. Up until recently, the growing gap between the wealthy and the not-wealthy, as well as the diminishing percentage of extremely-wealthy, has been happening fairly slowly, which generally makes any kind of change difficult to brew. In argentina, the financial crisis was sudden, and there was no adjustment period that would have let people get used to hunger slowly; that’s probably one reason why they took to the streets then, not any time prior to that when so many people were being disappeared. (as in, most people write off agitators disappearance as people having taken risks that they could have avoided to be “safe”, but suddenly watching your children starve to death before your eyes makes you see those risks as necessary for your family’s survival.)
All that to explain in a sort of round about way – get some sort of obviously evil dude in charge (or have some horrible circumstance occur that affects the majority of the people), and you’ll get people rising up in protest.
The question definitely becomes: is the bumper sticker advocating that we facilitate change by voting for our ideal candidate, or for the most evil candidate we can find? 😉
January 5, 2008 at 2:32 pm
Deb, I have been meaning to stop by on this one but it just slipped my mind. So here I am before leaving town. I’m with you about the two party system and loving the ambiguous meaning of the bumper sticker. The slogan reminds me of a segment in the movie titled Brewster’s Millions starring Richard Pryor, who plays Monty Brewster. If you have seen this movie, you may remember the part where his riduculous campaign slogan was “Vote for None Of The Above” in his effort to frivolously spend the millions he was tasked by the Executors of his Grandfather’s, or some relative’s Estate. Though the segment was funny, I find it representative of the feelings of the majority of our voting population.
I too have never agreed 100% with a candidate, but I generally take a different approach than most voters. Rather than look at what does a candidate mean to me from a personal vantage point, I try to assess which candidate will serve the greater good of our country. Personal motivations notwithstanding, I find this is the best approach in electing a candidate.
Part of the problem we have is the lackluster participation of eligible voters, limited candidates who generally are career politicians, and having no strict accountability (punishable by prison) for failing to honor their word and commitment to the voters.
Even after the IA Caucus, I remain undecided on a Presidential Candidate.
We are facing an increasing dilemma in our Federal System of government that appears to be on the continuing decline. I’m probably in the minority and may not agree with the masses. So, if all else fails, I’ll probably vote for myself as a write in candidate. Hawk for President, LOL!
Have a great weekend. I’m getting the hell out of town!
January 5, 2008 at 8:52 pm
Hawk, it should be expected that we won’t find a candidate that we can agree with 100%, that’s just an impossibility! I don’t think even the most idealist person would expect that.
As for assessing what will serve the greater good of the country, that’s an interesting and ambiguous quest of its own. Every person will naturally have a different view of what this will mean. The uber rich most likely think that protecting their material assets is for the best of the country, while people like me feel that supporting the necessities of life as a basic human right rather than privilege is for the best of this country. Others obviously feel that protecting corporations is for the benefit of this country. The entire process is far from universal.
I’m getting vexed about the fact that such a small handful of states get such a disproportionately large say in who will be the final candidates. That certainly doesn’t help the rest of us feel connected to the process, or as if our views have any impact on the end result.
I’d love to see a major overhaul of the entire system. It will never happen, but I would still love to see it.
Have a great weekend yourself, and thanks for sharing your thoughts. 🙂