Fight for Democracy: 2020 Primary

The 2020 U.S. election cycle is well underway and this Tuesday, March 3, 2020 is Primary day for many states, including California. So I'm going to talk a little about the Presidential Primary race and separately about why you should vote (spoiler: they are two different topics), though not specifically who you should vote for. This is aimed at my fellow Californians, but much of it also applies to voters across the country.

You should vote for a Presidential candidate because you might as well, not that it really matters much. Maybe that doesn't sound like the most motivating of reasons, but bear with me. More importantly, you should vote on Tuesday for the many other positions and ballot measures to be decided. In California we have a state-wide bond measure (13) which is important and deserves input from everyone. There are also Congressional seats on everyone's ballots, and while some of them might be foregone conclusions, many districts have important primary choices that will ultimately make a big difference in the general election. And there are even more local issues: in my city and county we have school bond measures and local supervisor choices that will make a noticeable difference in my life for the next several years. Voting matters and local politics often impact your life more than national - and your vote (proportionally) counts for more! If you want to do something in a political environment that increasingly feels distant and removed from our personal realities, voting in local elections is one of the best ways to get involved.

And since you're voting, you might as well vote for whoever you want in the Presidential Primary. And that's the key thing - vote for who you want. Don't worry about 'electability' or who's leading in the polls or who does the best in hypothetical matchups. Definitely don't listen to the pundits who tell you who you should vote for. And it's best if you don't base your decision off your gut. Don't worry about who you'd rather have a beer with. Don't listen to political ads or even give much weight to debate performances or official endorsements. You should vote for whoever you want and you should base your decision on the policies the candidate supports (check their websites and do some reading) and their likelihood of accomplishing the things you think are important. Too many people try to play three-dimensional chess and come up with the best strategy for their vote. If history tells us anything, it's that these rationalizations and guesstimates are totally inaccurate at predicting the future. Sure, sometimes they're right because every possible outcome is predicted by someone, somewhere, but that isn't a reason to believe in them ahead of time. Just vote on policy, actual written and articulated policy.

Policy is ultimately the reason why it isn't that important who you vote for in the Primary. Because it's going to come down to whoever the Democrats select versus Trump and the Republicans in the General Election in November. While there are significant and important differences between the policies of the Democratic candidates, those differences pale compared to the abhorrent policies of the Republicans. All Democrats want to expand health care coverage; all Republicans have been fighting for years to limit and repeal coverage. All Democrats agree on instituting some measure of reasonable gun control (like requiring background checks). All Republicans have fought for years to prevent such measures. All Democrats agree on passing (bipartisan) immigration reform. This one's tricky because a lot of individual Republicans support reform but as a unit they have blocked every attempt at passing actual legislation. Republicans are fighting for additional tax cuts to the wealthy and corporations. Democrats are fighting to increase minimum wage. Republicans have proposed cutting Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Democrats want to preserve those time-tested institutions. Republicans want to allow and encourage discrimination (as long as it's for religious reasons). Democrats want a fairer world with less bigotry (for any reason). Republicans had the chance to follow the Constitution and remove a President who has obviously and routinely violated his oath of office, broken many laws in the past and the present, lies repeatedly about everything and everything, assaults the norms of decency and fair play that hold our government together, and disgraced our country on the world stage. The Democrats did everything they could to stop him.

The differences between parties are a wide gulf and whoever wins the Democratic nomination will deserve and require the full support and enthusiasm of every decent American who wants to return democracy and rule of law to our country. If you're tired of politics being a gutter war fought waged through tweets and a never-ending news cycle of embarrassment, then electing a Democratic President (and Democratic Congress) is the only hope. So go ahead and choose your favorite candidate in the primary, but never lose focus that the real fight is much larger and more important, and all of us must come together to win back our society and our sanity.