an open letter to non-Obama/Biden voters: thinking outside the echo chamber

[jrtom]

I'm looking to have some conversations about the upcoming elections. (The US Presidential elections, primarily, although if there's anyone that wants to talk about WA Congressional or state-level elections, that's fine too.)



Most of my friends are, if not stalwart Democrats, pretty much in the tank for Obama. This means that I don't have as good a handle as I'd like on the views and motivations of everyone else: people that haven't decided, or that intend to vote for McCain/Palin, or that intend to vote for a third-party candidate, or that don't plan to vote at all.

If you are such a person, I would like to have a respectful conversation with you: to find out where you're coming from, and what your reasons and motivations are (and your fears, if applicable). I'm a bit of a political news junkie, so I've read any number of essays dissecting the mood of the electorate in various ways, but I'm not convinced that the pundits' and analysts' condensations of people's opinions are anything like the whole (or true) story. Anyway, ultimately it all comes down to people. You. Me. Everyone else here, whether you show up to vote or not. One way or another, we're all going to be living together after the election, and I think it's past time for me to learn more about you and why you think and feel as you do. Even if Obama were to win in a huge popular landslide--say, 65-35, which is unprecedented in recent memory--that's still more than a third of voters (and probably quite a lot of non-voters) that will really disagree with the outcome.


I freely admit that I am also an Obama partisan, although I do not agree with him on every issue. If you would like to ask _me_ where _I'm_ coming from (either my political philosophy, my feelings on various issues, or my own reasons for having decided to vote for Obama), that's welcome. I'd also be more than happy to help you convince yourself to vote for him, too, if that's what you want. (You are welcome, in turn, to try to convince me to vote for some other candidate, although you're unlikely to succeed.) But my _primary_ purpose here is to learn from (and about) people that are _not_ Obama partisans, not to proselytize.


People who support Obama/Biden are welcome to join in these conversations, but I want one thing clear from the start--to everyone, but especially to Obama partisans, because of my intended audience: be respectful, or your comments will be deleted. There's a lot of free-flowing anger and resentment, from a variety of sources and for a number of reasons. I want to understand those reasons and the opinions that underlie them, so please be respectful of them so that they'll be expressed freely.


If you fit the bill, and are interested in such conversations, feel free to post a comment to get the ball rolling, or to contact me via email. If you know someone else who you think might be interested, please point them here.



Let's talk.

Comments

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

What about Biden doesn't she trust? Or, to put it another way, in what way would she expect him to betray her, or her interests? I don't know any particular evil of Biden, but I don't know a great deal about him, either.

[gwyd.livejournal.com]

I think it's two things: like McCain, he's an establishment politician who hasn't done much to improve things for the middle class. (One of the things she liked about Obama is his economic policy). Also, like Mccain, there are serious questions about his integrity. (Biden=Plagarism scandal; Mccain=Keating 5).

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

The Biden plagiarism thing strikes me as having been a specific instance of a general Biden phenomenon of occasionally letting his mouth run ahead of his brain. It bothers me that he does this, and I don't really want him as President, but I don't consider it a character issue in quite the same way that it sounds like your mom does. I respect her reason for making that call, though I think she's making a similar mistake that I did in voting against Gore. (In essence, I voted Nader for two major reasons: first, because I wanted to promote the emergence of a viable third party, and second, because I thought that Gore didn't deserve my vote after some policy positions he'd held in the past (e.g. abortion) even though he changed them later. I still think that the former is a good goal--although that was a stupid way to pursue it--but the latter was a really bad call.)

[gwyd.livejournal.com]

I think she's making a mistake too, but I was unable to persuade her otherwise. In a very real sense, for her, Palin is a scary wing nut. McCain and Biden are untrustworthy career politicians with long legislative and public images she's old enough and involved enough to have taken issue with over the course of a long active political life. As a moderate, non-racist swing republican, she genuinely likes Obama, but not enough to vote for him with Biden as a running mate.

It sucks she's throwing away a swing state vote we rather need, but I am truly grateful that Palin's permanently scotched chances of her voting for McCain.

Did I mention she lives in PA?