It is late for me to “decide.” It is even later than usual for me to to vote. I can and usually vote absentee in person on the first day possible — I live in Virginia but work in Maryland so I have no trouble qualifying for the privilege to to do so legally. Normally I do it on the first day possible, which this year was January 16. Today I will go down to the County office building where I worked until I became a teacher, go in to the registrar’s office, and cast my ballot.
Why did it take me this long? Hard to say. In a sense I was pretty sure for whom I was likely to vote as far back as November. The choice started to become easier as time progressed. I knew I would never vote for Gabbard or Delaney from the start. I have previously expressed my problems with voting for anyone older than me, which had eliminated both Biden and Sanders, and more recently also excluded Bloomberg, in all three cases even before I got to particular issues that bothered me. I had problems with Booker on education, did not think Yang was qualified. As the field narrowed with the withdrawals of Harris and Castro my choice became even more obvious.
And yet I wondered. I looked at polling data and wondered if by March 3 my choice would have any realistic chance of getting the nomination. I looked at the results of of Iowa and New Hampshire. I also looked at the coverage being given each of the remaining candidates.
I knew that I would in the general vote for the Democrat regardless of whom the nominee was, even if it were someone I would not support in the primary. Even the VP choice would not be disqualifying, because the reelection of the incumbent would represent a catastrophe not only for our Republic but for the future of the world on so many levels.
After the Nevada debate, with its fireworks (which I appreciated!) and even with the general lack of attacks on so-called Republican who currently holds the office, I decided in this primary I would vote for the person I thought would by far make the best president, and not because I believe s/he would necessarily gain the most delegates. I think it quite possible that no one will gain the majority of first ballot votes, that the Superdelegates will therefore play a role (as I think they should), I am hoping my choice will still be in the mix, although ultimately that does not matter in my decision.
I am voting for Elizabeth Warren, and later today I will give her some more money.
On Wednesday we saw how effective a debater Warren unleashed can be. Oddly, that did not persuade me to finally decide. I knew how skilled a debater she could be. What I have seen and admired is that she listens to people, that she learns, that she acknowledges mistakes. All of that is important. So are her energy and her intellect (which is formidable). I greatly admire her tenacity as well.
I do not agree 100% with any candidate I have ever supported actively, for any office. Over the decades I have been actively involved in campaigns ranging from borough council in a community of 7,000 to significant roles in Presidential primaries, with perhaps my most notable activity being in the 2006 Senate campaign of Jim Webb.
I am now 73, with a wife living with a cancer that can be managed but not eliminated, myself having survived several (mild) strokes last fall, with a stent in my aorta (and hence some sympathy for two of the remaining Democratic candidates), who still works full time as a teacher, not merely because I really do need the income, but also because I know I can still be effective in helping shape young people for the futures before them. I have no pretense of being that active in any political campaign, and no illusions of transitioning to public office of any kind, even appointment to local boards.
I teach government, and thus of necessity I pay undue amounts of attention and energy to politics and related. In my 26 year career I have been through two presidential impeachments knowing that neither had any real chance in resulting in the removal of the man impeached. I have watched as the norms of our politics and political discourse have been systematically undermined over the past few decades, and watched the somewhat successful attempts by noxious folks to roll back the societal advances made during the 1960s into the 1980s (with of course some advances even through the last Presidential administration.
I have no intimations of my imminent demise, and yet realize that this might well be the last meaningful Presidential election I will see.
This country desperately needs leadership at the top that first and foremost is deeply moral. We saw that for 8 years under Obama, even if we disagreed with him on some policies and actions.
I do not at this point self-identify as a Christian. And yet my almost two decades split between the Episcopal and Orthodox churches have shaped a good deal of my thinking, as have my exploration of other religious traditions including the Judaism of my parents. The idea of not denying justice to sojourners in our land because we ourselves were strangers in Egypt is a key commitment of Judaism, and in my mind is of a piece with the commands of Matthew 25 about what we do to these the least of our brethren. While not myself a lawyer, I grew up in a family full of them (including a mother who was an Assistant AG of NY), and understand how the law can be used positively to make society more just and moral, as well as being used and even distorted for the benefit of the few and the already privileged.
I have lived long enough to see those of wealth who understood their responsibility to those without as well as those who think their own riches — however obtained — somehow privilege them to be beyond control, responsibility to anything beyond their own narrow self-interests.
Why Warren? In part because she has experienced an ordinary life growing up and getting educated before moving into the elite circles of law and politics — and still understands and remembers the difference. In part because she has sought to use law and politics to make a difference for ordinary people. In part because she finds ways of offering affirmation to the good ideas and actions of other. In part because she is willing to speak forcefully against things that are clearly wrong, as she demonstrated by reading the entire Mueller report and then calling for the impeachment of Donald J. Trump. As a teacher I also look at those she has taught and inspired, and here the work of Rep. Katie Porter shines out, like Warren not only brilliant but humane and deeply moral.
Humane and deeply moral
Perhaps as I age those become even more important to me as I make political decisions.
As I look back over the 7 plus decades of my life and think about those people who have had the greatest influence on me, those two expressions are consistent themes I see among all of them. Those to whom I would apply those terms include among others a teacher in high school, several professors at and a president of Haverford College, the now deceased former abbot of a Greek monastery who was for a decade my spiritual father, several fellow educators I deeply admire, some of my students from whom I have learned a lot, and most of all the woman who has been my closest friend and spouse for a total of more than 4.5 decades. There are public political figures I would place in the same category, some of whom I have met, some I know only through watching them. Some who immediately come to mind include James Farmer, Elijah Cummings, John Lewis, Margaret Chase Smith, Abraham Joshua Heschel ….
My support of Elizabeth Warren is simple. She is brilliant to be sure. She is certainly accomplished. But of far greater importance to me is that she is humane and deeply morale.
In a few hours I will go to the County offices and vote for her, even without knowing the results of today’s Nevada Caucuses. Then I will give her what money I can.
Why? My answer is simple.
It is the humane and moral thing for me to do.
Peace.