I give the debate a B-. Not enough about climate change, immigration, voting rights, etc. Both candidates did well in most areas.
I’ve studied the issues, followed the debates, digested both their websites. Thought on it, prayed on it, left it alone for a while and come back to it.
In the end, it’s Bernie for me. Hillary Clinton is just not an auditor. Let me explain.
Background: WM, 52. In 1982, I voted for Ted Kennedy and was awed when he came to give a speech at my alma mater.I wept the day he passed. In 1984, Ronald Reagan uttered what I still consider to be the worst thing that I’ve ever heard from a so-called leader: “Are you better off now than you were 4 years ago?”. All the great promise, accomplishments and principles of America — yes , many times not living up to them, with many faults and failures, but nonetheless a great nation — reduced to such a crass, small minded, ugly, fuck-you-i-got-mine and if-you-don’t-it’s-the-black-welfare-queen’s-fault meme that still drives the Republicans today.
I served in the Navy, attend church religiously, raised a family. Perhaps something of a Churchill figure — worked on Jesse Jackson’s campaign in 1984, but 10 years later thought some of Bill Clinton’s reforms were proper and needed. But the heart remains; I’d have loved to see Paul Wellstone president and proud that we have come far enough at least to elect an African-American president.
The candidates positions & “electability”. I’m not in agreement with either on 100% of issues. Both hit enough buttons, and both agendas are important. Save my point below, Hillary is probably more electable in the general election, but at the same time I fear that if the poor and middle class cannot hearken back to their forefathers who fought and sacrificed for worker’s rights, unions, a minimum wage, justice for all — if we cannot, as Bernie says, become active and involved in a revolution to make America work for all Americans and end the inexorable slide to oligarchy — then what good is the vote, what good is the past accomplishments?
Hillary — not an auditor. I was an auditor. One of the rules, or set of rules, we lived by were the independence rules. Those rules required us to be independent of our clients, and here’s the important kicker: in FACT and in APPEARANCE. What did this mean? One of my firm’s clients was a large chain. My brother-in-law was a meat cutter there. I was at the time, in my 2nd year, no power, no decision making capabilities whatsoever. My brother in law didn’t get bonus pay, stock options, or anything of the sort. His job wasn’t remotely connected to accounting. But you know what? I couldn’t work on that audit. When I reached the level of management, I couldn’t own even 1 share of stock in that company. No matter how small or remote the possibility that I would influence a decision about my firm’s opinion on the company’s financial statements, I couldn’t be associated with it.
Independent — in FACT and in APPEARANCE. It’s a code of ethics, a bedrock principle, a source of esteem and integrity for my profession. It’s not a 100% guarantee of a good audit, but it’s a firm grounding that we will call them as we see them and do the right thing by the “users” of the financial statements — i.e. the public, generally. Bernie meets this, Hillary doesn’t.
I am struck by all the rox/sux fighting on this site. All the arguments, good/bad/crazy, but in the end, rarely if ever is it said that Bernie won’t do the right thing and call them as he sees them. For Hillary, even her most ardent backers cannot tell us that the Big Pharma $$ will not affect her health care positions, the Wall St. $$ will not sway her from doing the right thing when it comes to the financial sector. The Clinton foundation’s murky contributions, the miraculous cattle futures trades, the unseemly use of a private email server in her role as a public servant. In all of this, the FACTs are that she did nothing wrong, no charges will be brought, and Republicans have certainly made mountains out of molehills or even ant hills. But in APPEARANCE? “There is no there, there” — except with Hillary, one can never be sure of this.
Bernie for President. He’ll be there — in fact, in appearance, with ethical, independent integrity — for us all.