I Want To Stand FOR Something

You go to a restaurant with 10 friends, when it’s time for dessert, 5 order ice cream and the other 5 order pineapple upside down cake.  You have sensitive teeth and ice cream causes pain, and you allergic to pineapple, so what do you order?  Of course you order the apple pie, I mean, really, is there even a second thought?  

Why do we put less thought process in who we exercise our right to vote for than we do in picking our dessert?

While we are not yet nearly done with the primary elections, the country seems to already moved on to the general elections with assumptions of who will be nominated.  From what I can tell, neither of those people are supported by the majority of their own party, much less by Americans in general.  In fact, many people really abhor them (for good reason, if you ask me) and don’t want either as President.  However, even more, they just don’t want the other one to win.

One of the candidates is running with a campaign with talking points about making American great again and getting our country back.  I’ll skip over, for now, the fact that our country still IS great and, um, it’s still here, under American control, but you know what is not so “great” about our country right now?  That our choices are so poor that the majority of people aren’t voting FOR someone, they are only voting AGAINST someone.  Is this the best we have to offer?  Have we as Americans become so jaded and determined to tear everyone down that we’ve scared off the good people from running?

Many people think this is the election that will make some big, mostly undefined, changes for good or for bad in our country and think this will be some kind of turning point.  Those same people, they are trying to convince you to vote for the candidate with the “R” so the “D” won’t win, or to vote for the one with the “D” so the “R” won’t win.  They don’t tell you why should vote FOR that candidate, only that you can’t let the other letter win.  We’re playing middle school playground mean girl politics.

If you really do stand behind one of the main party candidates, vote for them.  If you really want to make a change the landscape of our government, and not just exact revenge on the people you blame for your misery, quit ordering the ice cream or the pineapple upside down cake just because that is what everyone else is doing, or because that friend who talked behind your back ordered the opposite.  There are 3^rd party candidates.  Look into them.  You might find that one is everything you are looking for.  If people quit analyzing what the person sitting next to them is choosing, the apple pie just might be the most popular dessert on the menu.

We’re told that voting for a third party is a “wasted vote,” but if you ask me, voting for someone you can’t stand just so someone else doesn’t win is wasted freedom. 

Stop giving your freedom away.  I know I won’t.  That’s why they have wine, because a glass tastes even greater after you’ve done something you can feel good about.