My Conversation with a ‘Low-Information’ Voter
Mon May 05, 2008 at 03:37:04 PM PDT
I have to start out by saying that I am a little ashamed and embarrassed by the identity of the ‘low-information’ voter in question. It is none other than my very own father. Here’s a brief history to fill in some back story before I get to the details after the fold:
I assume that at least 95 percent of the people at this site are astute enough to notice my screen name and assume it means that at one point I was a member of the right wing. Some of you may think I am some sort of repub-troll in sheep’s clothing using an ironic screen name to deflect suspicion. Well I hope I don’t come off that way but please feel free to read my first diary for additional details of my conversion process. I’m going to move on.
When I was first introduced to politics at 14 years old I made the mistake of bringing my Dad into the right wing fold from a previous state of non-participation. While a got him in the water, he has sort of drifted aimlessly in and out for the past decade and a half. I say I am embarrassed because I have never made much of a concerted effort to modernize and revamp my Father’s political beliefs. Some would question that it is my responsibility to do this at all, but I feel a responsibility for the bum steer and subsequent lack of guidance to my dad’s political leanings. He is a bit scatterbrained. He picks up little tidbits and opinions from random ether ports and incorporates them into an idiosyncratic quilt of contradiction and antiquated logic. I don’t know how I escaped this logic process train wreck, but I may have gotten some of my mom’s pragmatism and I may still be headed down that path, seeing as how I have about 30 more years to get to his age. Despite having attributed a somewhat unique persona to my Dad, I would say that based on our conversation recently he could be considered among typical low-info voters. Damn the torpedoes, I will proceed with this premise at full speed.
Though he has shown a conspicuous lack of effort to thoroughly educate himself in the subjects he likes to discuss (except sports, a trait I have fully received) my Dad loves to talk about stuff. He is a ‘Chatty-Kathy’ about his job; sports (as previously mentioned); weather, road conditions and other drivers (he drives a truck for a living); and politics. It is the latter that I received some interesting insight on a couple days ago.
I won’t try to recreate the whole conversation because our brains and my fingers would hurt by the end, but I will list some of the more salient points:
On George W, Cheney, et al: I was perhaps most pleased by my Dad’s rant, though heavily laden with hyperbole, against of the current GOP corporate machine. He is extremely fed up with the corporate tax breaks and the shrinking incomes of the middle class. He can see that the right wing is created in the image of greed and looking out for number one. This makes me happy because I can see that at least the obvious things can sink in for some people. I can’t confirm at this time, but this is a man who, at the very least, was capable of pulling the lever for Bush in 2000, and possibly ’04. It is a testament to how a 90 percent approval rating can plunge to a 29 in 6 years.
On McCain’s Healthcare proposal: This is how the conversation got started. My Dad seems to be under the impression that McCain will give us all 15,000 dollars in tax breaks to purchase our own health care. Apparently I lack the full facts and figures on Barack Obama’s plan and single payer healthcare, as well as the ability to stop a speeding freight train as I was unable to impede the torrent of fallacies my dad has streaming through his head. I was pretty sure the tax credit McCain was proposing was 1,500 dollars, but I he couldn’t even tell me if it was a tax rebate or some kind of earned income credit. After becoming frustrated I changed the subject.
On the gas Tax ‘Holiday:’ Maybe it’s a function of his mistrust of the corporation pamperers in the GOP but my Father, to his credit, sees this as mostly a political ploy. Of course, he’s not one of the truckers that pay for their own gas, so that could make a difference. Also my Dad has a fundamental distrust of HRC, oil companies, and things that sound too good to be true. I am happy to report that he seems to be in the majority in disbelief of this silly proposal.
On Barack vs Hillary: On this one I can remember the exact quote: "if it’s Obama vs. McCain, I’m voting for Obama, if it’s Hillary – McCain, there’s no way I’m voting for her." I think this is definitely a holdover from his Conservative days in the 90’s. He went on to rant about how Hillary wants to tax everybody and tell everybody how to live, etc. etc. I wanted to poke a few holes in his logic, but seeing as I’m not the biggest fan of HRC right now, I didn’t have the heart for the effort. His reasoning for wanting Obama over McCain was simple. He wants something new. He wants a change from corporate priority over the little people. He is tired of the Clinton-Bush style top down politics and dynastic grip on the executive branch. Those are my words, not his, but I have to paraphrase because his ranting can be a little disjointed and rough around the edges.
On Iraq: He didn’t linger long on this subject, but I thought it was nice to hear what he did have to say. He was basically extending his anti-Bush argument, talking about the war as corporate profiteering and hurting the economy (nice to see that that meme has sunk in also). He seems to have a rather emotionless fiscal opposition to the war as opposed to a moral or national security based rationale. I still feel like he’s in the right column, even if he hasn’t absorbed all of the right reasons for it. I just worry that if I don’t add a few more objections to his list he may eventually be swayed back into supporting our continued presence there.
My thoughts in summary:
I realize that this is purely anecdotal and that my Dad doesn’t necessarily represent the general feeling of ‘low-info’ voters out there. I just hope that he is a window into the disillusionment one former stanch right wing working class guy can develop with 7.5 years of President Dip-Shit, Puppet Master Cheney, and friends in office.
This gives me hope that as soon as we have our nominee, Obama is going to crush McCain in the GE. I personally would vote for HRC, if she were to legitimately gain the nomination (which I don’t feel she can at this point). But I know my Dad and people like him are the reason she has such a constant high negative rating. She’s always saying how everyone knows everything there is to know about her, and she’s still going strong. Well, that cuts both ways. There are a lot of people that know everything they HATE about her and won’t ever be convinced otherwise, at least not in five months of campaigning.
I need to gather more ammo about the healthcare proposals so I can break down his fear of "socialized medicine" and his seeming admiration of McSame’s ideas. I also need to show him other reasons to support Barack and support ending the war in Iraq. I’ve got some time to solidify a new convert to ‘Obama Republican’ status. I must note that I am not going to fall into that category. I am a fully recovered Republican turned progressive. I occasionally listen to Limbaugh for a good laugh, instead of marching orders, and I am fully committed to getting the word about Obama out to those close to me and hopefully some strangers as well. I’ll be sure to write about any such encounters that may be interesting.
Thanks for reading my humble diary!
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