The no fly subject
I got subtle, real death threats four years ago around this time, and afterward I figured it just wasn't worth getting into. The internet has given a larger, broader forum for the angry and ignorant to yell their insights loudly and self-righteously, and unfortunately it's a place I stumble into from time to time. Of course, I'm talking about the upcoming presidential election, and how every ignorant, angry redneck and his/her unwashed, pseudo-intellectual hippie counterpart are more than happy to spend 10 hours at their keyboard smearing their stupid all over every fucking forum and message board they can find. Anyone who knows me even mildly knows I have something of a problem with just turning and walking away when someone says/does something blatantly stupid or (even worse) intellectually fraudulent. So, naturally, I tend to bring all mess of pain on top of myself when it comes to this shit.
Fuck, it's been about four years since I've actually used the terms "intellectually fraudulent" or my good old standby "intellectual sleight-of-hand". But here we go again.
Anyway, I figured it might be cathartic to turn all my cards face up for everyone who has any interest at all in my thoughts. I'm friends with several people who don't agree with me, but I don't see any of them as raving idiots. I take that as something of a point of pride, to be honest. I do have Angry White Man Syndrome pretty bad, which tends to color my attitude on politics a weeeeeeeeeeeee bit, or so I'm told. So this year, I feel like I almost have to feel bad for the fact I'll likely be voting for McCain in November. Why? Not because of what I think, but because since I'm a white male who does ok, many people naturally assume that I haven't given the process any more thought than "McCain good. McCain white. Me hate darkie. McCain give many monies to my kind. Must go exploit working man now."
As a disclaimer - I'm not going to go too deeply into "the issues" as the kids like to say. The way I feel about certain things at this point are not going to be argued out of me, and they are things that people fall very obviously on one side or the other. Those things have been done to death, and I will be more than happy to do them unto further death with you if you so feel like it, but I want to address some things that don't get so much attention and actually lead to the thought process of looking at the candidate - playing the player and not the cards, to borrow a phrase.
Let's start with a couple of relevant facts - I'm something of a centrist, but very obviously right of "the center" (which, by the way - does not actually exist as a person, just a scale point). So this presents something of a problem for voting for Obama right off the bat - Democrats and liberals, as a general philosophy, don't have much of an issue with a few things I personally dislike: government spending, as a big one (there are others, but this makes the easiest way to illustrate the following point). But wait, you might say, Bush has done more to increase government spending and general Federal bloat than pretty much any Democratic president in memory. Yes, that's correct - I didn't vote for that fucker once. McCain has the appeal of being a Republican that may in fact act like a conservative, instead of doing what Bush has done for years, which has been "I'm going to do whatever stupid shit I want, declare that this is the new Conservative way, and if you don't like it yur a terrist".
So there's that - off the bat, McCain has a bigger, better chance for enacting things I wouldn't mind seeing. Or rather, at least undoing alot of the stupid, stupid shit that Bush has done (Obama and McCain share this appeal to me) while not taking it too far in a direction I also don't like (Obama doesn't go here). Voting for Kerry was easy, because Bush fell flat on this test from the get go, and there was nothing at all to bring me back in his direction. So, here we are, logically: Is there anything that Obama offers that trumps the fact that a Democratic controlled Senate and Executive office will likely be as bad in my estimation as Bush's little 8 year vacation from reality has been? So far, not yet. Believe me, I've looked, I honestly have. I like Obama's message of renewal and hope and change and kittens and puppies and unicorns and tiaaaarraaaaaaasss, but as for the substance, he has so far had a very bad time of doing things other than making broad, fuzzy sounding goals.
But wait (again!), aren't McCain and Obama also similar in that regard? Yes, but here's where that whole "experience" argument comes up, and not in the way that the Republicans (and earlier, Hillary) were so eager to try and use. Bear with me.
I recently described voting for the president as a very complex bet. There's no predicting with 100% certainty what the person (and/or their administration) will do once elected and put into the office, as Our Boy Dubya has so magnificently showed us. All we, as people who were not gifted with fully functioning crystal balls and precognizant out of body experiences can do is bet. We play the odds. We can take a look at what the person HAS done, compare it to what they say they WILL do, and do the math in our own head. In McCain's case, I won't lie - the man has by all appearances sold out. Completely. I would much rather be voting for the McCain from eight years ago than the one that we see today. But that history is there still, a history of what he's done, and the fact that he's spent all this time in the doing. I'm willing to bet that beyond all the gladhanding he's doing to get into office, he's not going to steer that far away from what he has done. And further from that, it also indicates that when he makes the broad, fuzzy cookies-and-milk-happiness statements about how he wants to do this and that, there's the knowledge that more than likely he knows the reality of what it'll take to do it. Or at least make an earnest attempt and fail miserably at it, as politicians are wont to do from time to time.
With Obama, that history is short, it's thin, and it's telling to me. I don't imagine, as the Republican propoganda machine would like me to, that Obama is a five year old trying to sit with the big kids. He's obviously intelligent, he's obviously got good ideas, and he very obviously wants to make this country better and has the drive to try and do it. I just don't know how he really functions as a politician, or even if he knows how to function as a powerful politician in practice of actually being in a situation of control. Years and years and years of practice says McCain knows what goes on, how to do it, and the stark reality of doing it. Not everyone may like McCain, but even if his history makes you not want to vote for him, it's a large chunk of data you get with McCain. Obama I think is in for some very rude surprises that he may not be counting on simply because he can't have learned any better. Possibly, anyway. Again - it's a bet, isn't it?
To be honest, I think Obama's campaign doesn't get the credit it very richly deserves for being somewhat deceptive. McCain is not Bush, in a great number of ways. Sure, you can find some common practices or actions, but if you want to find a few commonalities and call two people identical, I can probably convince you that Reagan and Obama are "basically the same" too. But what do we get time after time with Obama's campaign - "Change." "Hope." The subtle but constant and strong message that "Vote for me, and you get a brand new day. With the other guy, it's the same sad shit." But hey it's not negative campaigning, no sir! Just like Bush's constant drumbeat (and yes, McCain's, but not nearly to the same maddening extent) of "Security" had the not-so-hidden message of "The other guy will get us killed by them thar terrists." One thing I do know for very certain about Obama is that deep down, he's very obviously willing to engage in some "same old politics" to get the win, which at the end of the day doesn't put him so far apart from McCain as he'd like himself and everyone else to believe.