The idea that gay voters would even fathom sitting out today’s elections is pretty preposterous — for it assumes the entire homosexual community in America is a single-issue bloc. And that, frankly, is a journalism fail, in as much as it would be to assume blacks, women, or seniors were all meeting in secret to decide whether it was worth skipping a Starbucks break to find their polling places. And besides, somebody has to make sure Tom Emmer, Christine O’Donnell, Meg Whitman, Sean Bielat, Carl Paladino, and Marco Rubio all see uphill (or impossible) battles. That, and YOU DO NOT GET TO BITCH about election outcomes if you don’t vote.
PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS
Max: 100% Co-Sign.
This particular election is of utmost importance to our commnity. If the certifiable lunatic tea party nutbags make inroads into our legislative process any and all positive movement for the Gays is basically halted. These lunatics will not negotitate nor budge on any aspect of their far right agenda. If a vacancy in the Supreme Court occurs it will be virtually impossible to get a replacement with any trace of a Gay positive history or leanings. You may have to hold your nose while you vote, but you need to vote against the entire repugnatican slate this time around…………
Andrew
Why is there a Strickland sign in a Whitman office?
ewe
I prefer incumbents out too and i am no tea party member i can assure you. Any problems? That is why we have three branches of government. Leave your fear behind and move forward.
the crustybastard
I vote in every single election, and have since they day I was qualified to vote; therefore I’ve earned the right to bitch.
I used to allow the word “Democrat” to play some role in my decision-making. That got me nowhere. My standard for voting has become “quid pro quo, Clarice.”
Now, if a candidate wants my vote, they must represent my interests. If they don’t bother, they cannot expect me to either. If they make promises to win my vote, then treacherously fuck me, I will actually vote against my interest to put them out.
Until we begin to hold them accountable, they won’t be.
Until they learn that we cannot be taken for granted, we will be.
Douglas Gibson Jr
Oh I will be voting, but for the Green Party candidates.
Devon
I feel like a battered wife coming back for more, but I did it.
I happily voted for John Hickenlooper, one of the very, very few politicians I like…Voted for Bennett and the other Democrats with significantly less enthusiasm…
Brian Miller
Funnier still is the idea that by voting for Tweedledee, we stop the evil agenda of Tweedledum.
And yes, for those of us who have been denied a real choice in the election (that’s most people who only have a choice between a Democrat and a Republican), we’re more than entitled to complain about the electoral results.
Even in circumstances where there was supposed “clear differentiation,” it always ends up “wrong.”
For example, if you voted for Obama on gay rights, you got a president whose activities in the key LGBT court battles are identical to what a President McCain would have done.
Caveat voter?
joedee1969
Dark Election Day?
http://americaspeaksink.com/2010/11/election-day-ignorance-chinese-food/comment-page-1/#comment-17421
DR
In order to encourage me to vote, the Dems need to present viable candidates with a solid voting record on a multitude of issues and who are capable of showing real leadership. I’m not going to vote for political hacks just because they have a (D) next to their names and a bunch of queer blogs tell me I should.
jack
Speak for yourselves. I’m most certainly not voting.
Paschal
@Douglas Gibson Jr: That simply helps the Republican candidate. If the U.S.A. used I.R.V. (instint run-off voting) or P.R. (proportioal represetation)voting systems you could do that but it does ot.
It’s important in states such as Florida that the Republican candidatedfor govenror doesn’t win because of redistricting which will occur after the election. The same is true for the New York Senate which gives disproportionate representation to Upstate New York, unlike the Assembly.
Red Meat
Well Brian, I would like you to tell me president who spoke of gay people in a positive way more than once a year that was on term.
Paschal
@jack: There are people who have fought for the right to vote. Not voting is a sickeig waste of a right.
Paschal
@Brian Miller: John McCain would have vetoed the Matthew Shepard Act and we wouldn’t even be discussig any other gay rights measures. Voting in Republicans, or helping them get voted in by abstaining, certinly does not help.
tjr101
We’re in danger of losing the most pro-lgbt speaker of the house in history. Everyone likes a Boner once in a while but not the one we’re about to get. I voted liberal democrat down the line!
ChicagoJimmy
A true dilema. Should I vote for people that share none of my beliefs, vote for people that say they share my beliefs while their actions show otherwise, or vote for people that share my beliefs but have no real chance to get elected.
When faced with that choice it makes it really easy not to show up.
Daez
@ewe: So, you would vote for someone that doesn’t share a single belief of yours just because they weren’t in office. You can’t possibly be that insane. Oh wait, maybe you can. Lets be honest, I don’t like who I voted for, but I like who I didn’t vote for a hell of a lot less. Politics is a game of keeping the absolute asshat out of office while letting the asshat in.
Daez
@the crustybastard: So, in order to get someone out that has broken promises to the gay community (Mr. Obama) you would vote for someone that favors an amendment to the constitution to ban gay marriage (Scarah Falin’). Awesomely good logic there.
The truth is, Democrats have to pander to the majority to get their votes in order to get into office, and that often means they ignore the rights of minorities, but at least they don’t go head on trying to destroy those rights like many Republicans do.
reason
I am proud to be a participant in our republic, and expressed my rights to vote this morning. Nope the gay community is not a monolith and the majority vote on a number of policies not just one. I never stay home, if one wants a new direction that is what primaries are for.
@DR: So basically you are saying you only support incumbents and career politicians. How does a politician build that record if they can’t get into office. It also seems like you did not vote.
Gregoire
Not only are there some lame, bitchy little one-issue voters here, but they’re happily willing to vote against their interests.
In my opinion, not much good is ever done in Washington. In every election you have two choices — somebody who is against your cause and somebody who is even MORE against your cause. (Even if they say the are for your cause, political realities always prove to diminish it.)
Occasionally, the first choice is even NEUTRAL to your cause, which is a best case scenario.
I’m sorry, but this really is the best you’re going to get with a politician that serves a multiplicity of constituents.
There’s what should happen, then there’s reality. If you still hung up on the what-should, then you live in a fantasy world. It’s disappointing for the rest of us that we have to live in a world where stupid people vote, somebody who would run to the arms of Sarah Palin and the Tea Party clowns because progress isn’t coming in EXACTLY they way you want it.
DR
@reason:
Absolutely correct I didn’t vote, nor will I vote today. The candidates I am faced with from the Democratic party are not quality candidates. It has nothing to do with incumbent or fresh meat, but everything to do with who they are, where they come from, and what they’ve done if they held office. None of them impress me, and I’m over voting for the so-called “lesser of two evils” when the candidates aren’t that good. I’ve done my homework, and this was not an easy decision to reach, but it’s the decision I’ve reached based on various factors including electability, entrenchment within the party system, the state of the districts they are leaving, and what they did when in office (for those who were in office).
Scare tactics are done, they don’t work on me any more. And if that’s what it takes to shake up the Democratic party, then so be it.
BillCooney
Anyone who doesn’t vote gets the government he deserves! I’d rather have a useless Harry Reid than a looney tune like Sharron Angle. Someone so extreme cannot have the “people’s will” at heart. BTW, any Republican elected today should vow to not accept the Government Employee Health Insurance offered to members of Congress. If they don’t, then they’re just HYPOCRITES!
Douglas Gibson Jr
@Paschal: Doesn’t matter to me if the republicans win – no difference between them and the democrats – Green party is the only party that will give us equal rights – everyone needs to realize this
Douglas Gibson Jr
@tjr101: In my humble opinion, Nancy Pelosi is not a liberal
Justin
@Douglas Gibson Jr: The Dems on a nationwide level certainly have more to do to impress me, but Green Party candidates are not electable on a national scale. Unfortunately we have a choice between the two. You may not like either choice, but one is definitiely better. The analogy I would use is would you rather overdraw your bank account by $10 (D) or by $1,000 (R)?
Douglas Gibson Jr
@Justin: If everyone would vote Green who states here that they don’t like the other choices then maybe we could elect some. We are never going to get what we want until we votw for those who will give it to us.
Jeffree
I’m not a single-issue voter–the economy, healthcare and education are important to me, in addition to LGBT rights. Leaders one party have campaigned on changing the minimum-wage rules—although I now work for slightly more, I have friends and family members who would be impacted if the floor were reduced. Rolling back the recent health reform would also be a negative.
I voted absentee because I followed my homestate elections closely and plan to move back–possibly.
None of our choices are ideal, but I feel it’s important to be counted. Some elections boil down to a very small % of votes.
tjr101
@Douglas Gibson Jr: She supports same-sex marriage and got DADT passed through the house. Unfortunately for you, America will never be as liberal as you will like. Voting Green is akin to voting Republican!
Douglas Gibson Jr
@tjr101: Let’s see
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0509/22178.html
http://www.ontopmag.com/article.aspx?id=3785&MediaType=1&Category=26
http://community.tasteofhome.com/forums/t/799302.aspx
And oh by the way – where is that single payer healthcare?
Voting Green is voting for what I believe in. Sorry if you don’t.
Queer Supremacist
I vote Libertarian whenever they’re on the ballot. I don’t want the government to have any power over my health insurance or care; think about it, do you want some fundamentalist redneck cracker breeder congressman from Alabama whose daddy was in the KKK to have any say in the treatment of HIV/AIDS, or whether boys can get the HPV vaccine, not to mention any other gay health issues. Nor do I want them helping myself to any part of my paycheck. And I want anti-gay terrorist states nuked. Not rebuilt, nuked (I disagree with the Libertarian Party’s anti-war stance and I think the neoconservatives are wimps).
If you vote Democrat, you are an enabler of the status quo. When Saddam Hussein Obama used the 9th Circuit Court to reenact bigotry, there is no way Republicans can be worse. I remember inaction by Reagan on AIDS but even if he had gone to every gay bar in America handing out condoms you all probably would have thrown them in his face. Whether Jimmy Carter in a second term or Ted Kennedy would have been much better I highly doubt. But I don’t remember any of his religious wrong supporters’ (who first became a political bloc to support Carter) anti-gay wet dreams turn into reality. Either way, AIDS is not an exclusively gay disease. And as for judges, remember who appointed Vaughn Walker. Meanwhile, Bill Clinton passed DOMA and DADT, which, if he thought of us as any more than a cheap date. And the FMA was never more than a cynical ploy to get votes. Who gives a shit what Saddam Hussein Obama says? With what he has done he has proven himself to be the biggest homophobe to ever hold the Oval Office.
We can run our own lives. That’s the American way. It was our protesting that got the drug companies to get the ball rolling on HIV meds. I am not a single-issue voter either, and your socialist pipe dreams need to join its kissin’ cousins, Communism, Fascism, and Nazism, in the dustbin of history. Communist countries were no friends of gay people. Even in the so-called “social democracies” of Europe unassimilated Muslim immigrants are taking advantage of the governments’ generous benefits and using their free time to bash gay people, while they throw the R-word at us for objecting to Islamic homophobia and expecting Muslim immigrants to follow the law. And gays have little recourse. It is as bad as bullying at American government-run schools, where school administrators usually blame the victim. The last thing I want is for the USA to go down that road. You want public services, you pay for them voluntarily. You want to help the poor, I encourage you to do so yourself. We are not babies who need the government to do everything for us.
As John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton, first Baron Acton said in 1887: “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” The only way around this is to limit the powers of the government. The government must be forbidden from denying us our rights any longer.
Sincerely,
Queer Supremacist, ex-Democrat for 8 years and counting
ggreen
Election question: Voter, which do you prefer apples or oranges?
Please vote for either apples or oranges only.
Green party Voter: I like spaghetti and my cats name is mittens. Vote green and waste your vote.
Chris
As always I come away disillusioned and disappointed and thinking I’d be better off not reading comment sections. Not voting, voting third party, “voting out the incumbent?” Ill-advised, ineffective, and ultimately self-defeating. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Look, the American system of election is not some menu from which you get to pick the candidate who is perfect for you. It’s a system where two, and occasionally three, candidates for major office can secure enough funding to reach enough voters to be viable, and you, the voter, GET TO PICK FROM THOSE OPTIONS. In order to run a viable campaign, candidates have to appeal to a broad base of supporters, and that means they are almost never going to match your desires or “beliefs,” as some folks put it, point-for-point. Instead you have a small number of candidates who are proposing different approaches to government, and you get to pick which you like best.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not opposed to the idea of third-party candidates, but in the majority of races they are simply not viable, and to vote for one is throwing your vote away. Worse, it’s denying a vital vote to whichever viable candidate aligns more closely with your priorities. Yes, I realize if everyone who likes third party candidates voted that way, the parties could be viable, but as long as you know that’s not reality, why keep voting that way?
As for not voting as a means to “teach the party a lesson,” that’s completely wrong-headed. Candidates don’t campaign to try to activate non-voters – they campaign to appeal to those who DO vote. If those of us who feel the Democrats haven’t been liberal enough suddenly stop voting, the Dems aren’t going to move further left – they’re going to move further right, in an effort to pull more moderate voters away from the Republicans. If we want to shift politics, we need to show that our votes are there for the taking, not vanish every time we don’t feel like we’re being stroked enough. Yes, I’m bitter and angry. Yes, I feel like I was a sucker to think Obama was going to be a real liberal in the White House for once, but I also understand the political process and the REALITY that taking my ball and going home is hurting myself, not the party.
Honestly, I feel like a lot of you, if offered two foods that weren’t your favorites, would sooner starve to death than eat one. This isn’t about electing the perfect candidate, it’s about surviving until someone more perfect comes along.
ron
@Chris: Well put, Chris. If the Republicans get control of the House, we’re going to see a whole lot of nothing get done for the foreseeable future. It’s going to be insufferable.
DR
So I’m supposed to vote for the guy who dipped into an unaudited slush fund to pay his own salary while other state employees were not being paid because he has a (D) next to his name?
I’m supposed to vote for the candidate who has run twice against the same incumbent and lost and is trying for a trifecta of losses because her name has a (D) after it?
I’m supposed to vote for the guy who comes from a county and city which is teetering on the verge of bankruptcy and hand him my state because his name has a (D) after it?
I’m not an idiot; these aren’t viable options.
Douglas Gibson Jr
@Chris: Why keep voting the way you are when it is not accomplishing anything. Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is the definition of insanity – so says Einstein.
Douglas Gibson Jr
@Douglas Gibson Jr: And yes, I’d rather starve than eat liver
PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS
@DR: Sure there are a lotta problems as you correctley point out with a (D) after a candidates name…………
But you have to consider what a house and senate with a repugnatican majority will most likely bring about a whole lot more hurt on the Gays than havin a (D):
~ DATD never repealled (R)
~ Ammendment to the US Constitution to prevent Gay marriage (R) ~ Another lockstep rightwing justice on the Supreme Court (R)
As I said in post #1 you may have to hold you nose real tight like when voting today. As bad as things (R) now they (R) gonna be a whole lot worse for the Gays if the repugnaticans gain enough seats………
Dallas David
I voted today, but without enthusiasm.
Here in North Texas, “liberal democrats” are about the same as “moderate republicans” in Massachusetts.
I voted mostly
Democrat & Green
Libertarian
no votes for Republicans.
Not an ideal slate of candidates, but as they say in the sausage factory, ya gotta vote for the best of the wurst, or else you’ll end up with the worst of the wurst.
Charlie
There are lots of great reasons to vote for the Green Party, but one that stands out in my mind is:
If the Democrats always count on “Green Party aligned voters” to vote Democrat then it doesn’t make much sense for them to work on impressing anyone but the middle.
I would like for the Dem’s to be very, very concerned about keeping the left happy while they work on the middle.
That means that significant Green party turn out could cost the Democrats an election, but then they may have to re-evaluate what they are doing.
DR
@PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS:
No.
I’m not going to hand the governorship of the state to someone who managed to run a major county into financial hardship. I’m not going to vote for the party darling who has lost twice because the Dems refuse to find a better candidate. I’m not going to vote for someone who makes sure his own paycheck is covered while rank-and-file employees go grocery shopping at the local food bank, max out credit cards and were at risk for losing their homes because they didn’t get paid full salary for FIVE MONTHS.
This isn’t an election just about gay issues for me, it’s about the fact that the candidates with a (D) after their name were poor candidates I wouldn’t vote for. Ever. I don’t care if a candidate claims to be “GLBT friendly” if she or he either can’t get elected, is so self-interested he doesn’t care that state employees face personal bankruptcy, or is expected to run a state when he could barely run a county without controversy and left the largest city in said county in a bad financial place.
GLBT friendly won’t keep food on my table, a roof over my head, a steady paycheck, etc.
Kev C
Vote only for people who represent you, your values and priorities. If they don’t represent you, they represent someone else. Don’t vote for people who represent someone else! EXCLAMATION POINT! That’s all you can do. If no one is on the ballot who represents you, don’t vote, but become active in getting people into politics who do represent you.
the crustybastard
@Daez:
Democrats deserve my vote because they have to pander, then ignore my rights?
With that, I return your “awesomely good logic there.”
Fault Lines and Broken Mirrors
@Paschal: It’s not a right if you’re being forced to vote.
@Chris: “Honestly, I feel like a lot of you, if offered two foods that weren’t your favorites, would sooner starve to death than eat one. This isn’t about electing the perfect candidate, it’s about surviving until someone more perfect comes along.”
It should not be that way in a nation which prides itself on its democracy.
Chris
@Fault Lines and Broken Mirrors: I don’t disagree with that. I’m not saying the way it IS equals the way it SHOULD BE, but the important thing right now is that’s what it IS.
These guys saying “don’t vote if they don’t represent you” are so far off base, and they (or that mentality, anyway) is the reason this country is in such a mess – because the “other side” thinks the same way.
“I really [oppose gay marriage/oppose abortion/hate Black people/hate Mexicans], and this candidate shares my belief. He REPRESENTS ME, so I guess I’ll vote for him even though he’ll send my job overseas, leave my family penniless, send my military-enlisted son into a needless war, and bail out the bank that’s foreclosing on me.”
This just isn’t the way these elections work – there are times during the political process when you can try and push the candidate who best matches your interests, but when it comes to Election Day, you get two choices. TWO. In some states, maybe three. YOU PICK THE ONE YOU THINK WILL DO THE BEST JOB. Not the one who offended you least in the past, not the one whose name most appeals to you or whose campaign ads were the prettiest. The one you think will DO THE BEST JOB.
Well, good job guys, because you didn’t vote, and all you had to do was tune in last night to see the Democrats talking about how they need to get more moderate, to push more tax cuts, to communicate better with the Tea Party, if they want to win elections. You made yourselves invisible to the candidates and pushed American politics further to the right. Way to teach that party a lesson!
Someone I know put it this way: “Not voting is the same as voting for the winner.” Well, the Republicans came away with a big win yesterday, so congratulations to all of you non-voters for voting Republican.
Seriously, I wonder if when these guys get to a fork in the road, maybe they just sit there refusing to take either route because neither one “really represents them.”
Chris
So, to review, in case you’re wondering why the Republicans will continue to win elections and erode our rights, just peruse the comments on this post. While voters on the right seem to have the good sense to get behind a candidate who may not precisely match their specific interests, voters on the left just can’t get their acts together. They’d rather throw their votes away on principal, even if it means living under an oppressive regime that not only fail to advance our rights, but actively sets them back.
the crustybastard
@Chris:
“Voters on the left” got their acts together sufficiently to provide Democrats both houses of Congress and yet another house on Pennsylvania Avenue. Just like they did in ’92. How were they repaid?
Yes, gays know that Republicans generally aren’t going to promote their rights, but they also know that 8 years of Bush Administrations do as much damage to gay rights as the Clinton Administration did in 2 years (military gay ban ’93, DOMA ’94).
Now this administration is fiercely advocating against us and deliberately obstructing whatever progress we’re making in federal courts, and you can characterize that however you like, but it’s exactly what any Republican administration would do.
When you send gay voters a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” message, they hear it.
Chris
@the crustybastard: First of all, we won’t know what damage “8 years of Bush Administrations” really did to us until we see what impact the current Supreme Court has on LGBT rights. Certainly the appointments of Roberts and Alito tipped the court heavily in favor of corporations, which led directly to the Republican victory, which may lead to grievous injury to LGBT rights nationwide. This is far from stopping at the Federal level, where the worst thing we should expect from the next two years is a Congress that does nothing. Legislatures and governors in almost every state have swung further to the right. The Iowa Supreme Court judges who ruled in favor of marriage equality are all out of work. Here in Pennsylvania we’ve seen annual efforts to amend our state constitution to ban same-sex marriage, but they’ve always fallen short because we had a Democratic majority in our Legislature and a Democrat governor. Well, not any more. For the first time, it looks like such an amendment stands a real chance of passing.
As for the Bush appointees on the Supreme Court, one can never assume anything for certain, but we can be pretty close when it comes to predicting the LGBT-related opinions of Justices Roberts and Alito, both of whom continue to actively fund-raise for radical right-wing organizations. Are you suggesting that there’s no difference between those two and Obama’s appointees? How do you figure the court will decide on matters like DOMA and Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell? How do you think those decisions will go if the GOP retakes the White House in 2012 and has the opportunity to replace a couple more justices?
Mind you, all this is argued based on another premise I strongly disagree with, which is that LGBT voters should make their decisions based on LGBT policy. Personally I see several issues as much higher priorities at present than LGBT issues: separation of powers, civil liberties, economic policies (particularly entitlement programs and “revitalization/stimulus” funds) and national security / secrecy. Fortunately my positions on all of those issues push me to the left, so it’s immaterial.
The bottom line is, “damned if you do/damned if you don’t” is untrue, and worse it’s a talking point that the Right fed to voters on the Left in the hope of keeping them home – and they succeeded. Am I fed up and frustrated with the Democratic party? Absolutely. I’m infuriated by a number of their policies. But it is simply illogical – and more importantly, incredibly self-destructive, to conclude therefore that it makes no difference which party is in power.
the crustybastard
Democrats are terrible, but Republicans are worse? My, my. What a terribly original argument.
The fact that you don’t think my rights should be a priority to me certainly explains your alignment with the Democratic Party.
Their lame “we want it for you but we’re not going to get it for you” shit isn’t going to fly with me anymore. Neither are charming bullshit speeches and cocktail party invitations where they use my money to fuck me.
But hey, it’s America. If that’s what you’re into.