I am one of those Potomac voters. Or Chesapeake voters. (I am a Virginia voter. Is it too hard for the media to say, "Maryland, Virginia, and DC?" Does everything need a catchy name? Ah, well, that is the least of the media's transgressions.)
I am not voting. Until this afternoon. (Gotcha?) My kids want to vote with me, as they have done every election since they were born, so I'm waiting until they get out of school to go cast my vote.
I'm still undecided as to which button I will push. (Our precinct has touchscreen machines.)
I am one of those oft-maligned people here who is a once and future Edwards supporter. While I didn't literally cry over his suspending his campaign, I certainly regret that he did so. This was to have been the first time ever that I would have been able to cast an enthusiastic vote, and to actually vote for whom I wanted, rather than Generic Democrat X. I've been voting nearly half my life and have yet to be able to vote for the candidate I actively and happily supported and have it count for anything.
And I will confess that I wish, mightily, that Edwards had endorsed somebody. As is my wont, I will vote for whomever is not the candidate he endorses (probably tomorrow), because I'm the one who always picks the losing horse, the slowest grocery store line, and the wrong lotto numbers.
I asked, the day he suspended, for Obama and Clinton supporters to woo me into their camps. I said, "Tell me about your candidate! What gets you fired up about your candidate?" Because I was all fired up about Edwards, and I desperately wanted to feel that passionately about whomever I eventually cast my vote for, once Edwards stepped down. I wanted to know what galvanized people about Clinton and Obama. I wanted to know what I was missing. The diary went better than expected. People stayed pretty positive about their candidates and, for the most part, refrained from bashing the other candidate. It could have gone worse, certainly, given the ugly way Primary Fever has been sweeping through here the last few months. And lots of people offered up some real, substantive information about both Clinton and Obama, and I was grateful for the ready-made links that took me to solid information about each candidate.
It didn't sway me either way, though. I listened with open ears and heart and mind, and I clicked the links and I read the positions. I saw some really enthusiastic responses about each candidate, but I wasn't able to catch either wave.
I watched the last debate with great interest. I thought that might be a defining moment for one or the other candidate, might cement my opinion and make my choice clear. I thought Clinton, actually, won the first half of it. I feel like her domestic positions are slightly better-formed than Obama's. Or maybe I just like the way she talks about implementing her plans better. I don't know. Obama won on foreign policy issues, as far as I was concerned. Neither candidate overwhelmed me with zinger personality, or with fire in the belly. I admit that warmth and fire are both factors in how I perceive a candidate and how happy I am to cast a vote for him or her.
But yeah, nothing.
The thing that strikes me is that, once again, I am looking at a Lesser of Two Somethings issue to determine my vote. Once again, my vote will be based more on negative spaces than on positive shapes. Whom do I dislike less? Whom will I mind less seeing giving speeches for the next four or eight years? Whose positions are less establishment? Whose posturing and campaign tactics have I disliked less? I suppose this is the primary of the Lesser of Two Lessers for me.
I liked being excited about voting for someone forward-looking and positive, "more" something and not "less" something, better than I like how I'm feeling today. It's a letdown to go from feeling stoked up about voting to feeling like I'm just doing my duty (closing my eyes, thinking of England).
This is a history-making primary season. My vote, in particular, probably doesn't matter enough in itself to even warrant all this agonizing I've been doing over picking a candidate. I'm not a delegate, and my state doesn't have a high delegate yield, anyway. I imagine Obama will carry my state, so frankly, I could probably stay home and know that it will probably come out the same way with or without me.
I regret my feeling of apathy, am sorry (for myself, natch) that I don't feel excited about being part of this historic primary. Regret that I don't feel like my vote matters - but even with it not mattering, and it really doesn't, it would be good to feel good about my vote anyway. To feel like I'm part of the history-making both in body (the button I push) and in soul (Yay! for [my candidate]!). And I just don't feel that way. All the oomph has gone out of this primary for me and I... just don't care a whole lot about it one way or another. It's not like my vote matters to anyone but me.
I will go and vote anyway. I have to set an example for my kids, and they look forward to voting every time there's an election. I let them push the buttons, you see, after telling them which ones to push. (Given my indecision, I briefly toyed with the idea of letting them choose the button themselves this time.)
It is a process, despite my ambivalence, in which I have a responsibility to do my little, meaningless share. It is an exercise in being A Responsible Citizen and in showing my children how to be Responsible Citizens. Even when they are not excited about their votes. Even when their votes don't really count. It is a habit, this of being part of the democratic process, that one should not take lightly nor dispense with even when one is as apathetic about the choices as I am. As I said in another diary, lacking excitement about the choices is no excuse to not get my ass out there and cast a vote. Better to feel less-than-overwhelmed about the choice I'm making than to not make a choice at all.
Come November, my choice will be a lot easier than my decision this afternoon. I'd vote for a yellow dog. Or even a blue dog, if that's who was up against the Republican. But for today? I still don't know whose name on the screen I'll let my children touch.
Not that it matters much anyway.