Today is Monday the 25th of October, and the U.S. midterm elections are just a week and a day away now. Granted, my experience is not extensive, but I believe this is the most charged election season that I can remember. So I knew, months ago, that I would want to make a blog post about my thoughts on it prior to the voting (actually, I've already voted, via absentee ballot). Just as thousands, if not millions, of people have over the last few months, I was feeling really angry about the election a few days ago. Since I'm a liberal, you can guess at whom I was angry. But I want to take a page from the Stewart/Colbert playbook for my blog. I am going to tell you why I think you should vote Democrat in the 2010 midterm election. But I'm not going to do so by telling you all the things I hate about what Republicans are doing. I'm going to do it by telling you what I think Democrats are either doing right or are standing for - in other words, why I'm voting for Democrats rather than against Republicans. Without further ado...
There is a mountain of issues facing the nation right now, which of course is one reason why there is so much attention on these midterm elections. These issues relate to and affect one another quite a bit, so I'll try to go as smoothly as possible from one to the next, showing how I think they're connected without being too tangled (hopefully). Then I'll end with why I think the Democrats are best suited to handle this web of issues.
The economy, unsurprisingly, is considered the most important issue by a large number of Americans. This is a good place to get a bird's-eye view of our country's situation: I believe that the U.S. is at a critical economic juncture, and that we must take a long-term perspective on the direction of the economy now. We'd been heading for this point for at least 10, maybe 20, maybe 30 years: it happened to be in 2008 that things came to a head, and now the economy is sputtering. Of course, we should do our best for the unemployed and those worst off; but we must also rebuild the national economic infrastructure - not as it was, but as it must be to meet the challenges of the 21st century and the increasingly globalized economy. If we improve on many of the following issues, it will go a long way.
The 2008 financial collapse was a huge shock for just about everyone, and was perhaps especially scary to see just how important a few of those gigantic companies were to the entire economy. There was a lot of questioning of this system directly afterwards, but it's since dissipated. We need to get better regulation of this industry - and more importantly, better monitoring and enforcement. It's not the bankers' billions I want to protect, it's the trillions in ordinary peoples' savings.
Two more aspects of the economy, one personal to each American and the other a more broad connection, are taxes and the deficit. I bring them up not because I think they're particularly important, but because I'm concerned that too many Americans think they are the most important. I could have a whole blog post about why I support a healthy tax system, but for the moment let me simply say that now in particular it is needed to help our nation through this situation. The budget deficit and national debt issues have been around since the 1980s (other than a respite at the end of Clinton's presidency thanks to his efforts). And while it does need to be addressed, suffice it to say that it is not one of our more challenging nor dangerous problems, and it's best dealt with gradually, not all at once.
Fortunately, one issue I believe both Democrats and Republicans agree on (though to varying degrees and means) is education. If we can start to do a better job throughout the nation, it will be good in so many ways. It will prepare children for the 21st century economy, as I mentioned above; it will once again provide upwards mobility, especially for the currently impoverished; and in general, it will create a more open-minded, compassionate population. A few specifics: we need to concentrate on science and math again, making them attractive to elementary as well as college students (too many of the brightest just go into business or law). We also need to update postsecondary education for the 21st century (but not abandon the liberal arts) and make it more widely accessible.
The final issue I'm going to mention is the environment. There is simply overwhelming scientific evidence that the climate is changing rapidly (relatively speaking) due to human actions. We don't know exactly what all of the effects will be, of course, but we know that there are so many interconnected, sensitive factors involved that the potential consequences are utterly catastrophic. This is THE perfect example of the frog getting killed in a slowly boiling pot of water. You don't want your kids and grandkids to have to pay the national debt? That pales in comparison to what they'll pay for global warming - if they even can do anything about it by then.
There are obviously other issues. There's the war in Afghanistan, which I'm still unsure about; I'm also encouraged by recent reports of success in the Kandahar area, but discouraged by news of Iranian and Pakistani unhelpfulness (yeah, I just made up a word). There's also illegal immigration, which I don't think about as much living here in the upper midwest. They are important, for sure, but I'm choosing not to take a strong side in this blog post.
So, why Democrats? Under Barack Obama's leadership, I believe they have done their best to confront these short- and long-term issues head on. They passed a stimulus bill which helped keep the economy from falling into depression, despite not completely turning things around. They passed financial regulation, which, while not perfect, is at least a start. Ditto for health care (another huge issue that I forgot to mention, but worthy of a whole post in itself). Obama hasn't been perfect, but I believe he is doing his best to confront many of America's biggest issues, not just the politically expedient ones (taxes, deficit, etc.). There are good and bad politicians for both sides. But while Republican leadership irresponsibly ordered its members to merely oppose anything Obama wanted to do (pure politics) for the last two years, Democratic leadership focused on the nation's health, not its own popularity.
These are simply my views on the coming election, and I hope that you will vote.
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