Feel the Fear and Vote Anyway
Nov 15th, 2012 by Kimberly
Read carefully, folks: there will be a quiz at the end of this column.
Some little kids love to ask “why.” Â Ever wonder what happens to those kids when they grow up? Â They become political pundits.
The talk this week has centered on why Mr. Romney lost the election. Â (Occasionally on why Mr. Obama won, but not as much. ) Â The president’s approval ratings barely topped 50%, and the number of people who thought our country was going in the wrong direction was nearly as high. Â (Responses frequently contradict each other, depending on how you ask the question.) Â Unemployment hovered around 8%. Â Maybe nobody besides Fox News expected a landslide Republican victory, but talking heads on both sides of the aisle declared it a toss-up. Â Now, of course, every news outlet says we should have foreseen a decisive Obama victory. Â Seven days ago, however, only Nate Silverman staked his reputation on the certainty of Mr. Obama winning, and many folks said he was crazy.
Folks, I’m getting tired of the endless rehashing, so I’m going to answer this and a few other questions for you.
Why did Mr. Romney lose? Â Two reasons. Â One, Mr. Obama was the incumbent, and all other things being equal, people go with the devil they know. Â Two, the Republicans beat up their own candidate before nomination was locked down, saving the Dems the trouble.
Every four years, our political parties play their own version of the Hunger Games. Â Send all candidates into the room, let them fight it out and the last one still standing gets to run for president. Â It’s cruel, but more or less fair in years like 2008. Â That year, George W. Bush had maxed out his time and was unable to run for a third term. Â His vice president Dick Cheney was best known for accidentally shooting a friend during a hunting trip. Â It was clear the Republicans would have to look farther afield than usual. Â The Democrats hadn’t seen political daylight in a couple of years, and several candidates found their way into the sunlight at the same time. Â Both sides slung a lot of mud before the primaries were over. Â Nobody came out clean. Â (It can be argued that Mr. Bush’s record gave the Democrats an edge that year, but it wasn’t the fault of the primary process.)
This time, however, only one side had to choose. Â So for a year, while the Republicans called each other names and pulled hair, the Democrats washed their faces and arranged the schedule of who would wax eloquent for Mr. Obama first. Â It’s been said that political campaigns spend a lot of time digging up dirt on their rivals. Â As NPR pointed out this week, Team Democrat didn’t have to look. Â The Republicans laid it all out for them in PAC-paid commercials.
Looked at that way, it’s kind of a miracle that the incumbent ever actually loses.
But lest we get too complacent, we of the progressive persuasion would do well to remember that Mr. Obama only won by 2.7%. Â It was the fifth closest election in our nation’s history. Â True, the networks called it by 8:30 on Tuesday night, and 2.7% is significant enough by nationwide political standards. Â However, for those Democrats talking about Mr. Obama’s “landslide” victory, I would argue that 2.7% does not a landslide make. Â Those same Democrats made noise about taking back the majority in the House of Representatives this year, and that certainly didn’t happen.
The weird part isn’t that America voted for Mr. Obama, it’s that we voted in nearly the same balance of power that we had before. Â Despite all our complaining, we voted for the status quo. Â Why did we do that? Â Because we’re scared, probably. Â When we’re scared, we run away from change, not toward it.
That leads us to the big question – what are we so scared of?
At this point, I run out of answers. Â I can only guess. Â So here are my top five options:
1. Â We’re scared of the Democrats being in charge. Â The last time the Democrats controlled the House and the Senate, they bickered among themselves. Â Love them or hate them, you have to give Republicans one thing: they know how to work together. Â Certain Democrats – I won’t name names because I’ve worked hard to forget them – took great glee in holding up votes by declaring that they weren’t sure they could vote for a bill until it satisfied all their personal whims.
2. Â We’re scared of Republicans being in charge. Â The Republicans have suffered from that togetherness that they do so well. Â The thing about extreme party loyalty is that it puts you in a pickle when the crazies come out, which they have lately, in record numbers. Â When women are raped, they do in fact sometimes get pregnant. Â Gay people do not actually have any control over meteorological phenomena, and thus cannot cause hurricanes. Â Corporations are not people. Â Most of us know these things. Â If the party continues to stand behind them – and remember, eventually they took Todd Akin back into the fold – the Republicans will still be scary.
3. Â We’re scared of a third political party running things. Â People from both sides will claim that it’s high time our system evolved and gave us more choices. Â However, when asked to name what a third major party might look like or whether we would ever vote for one, most of us get very quiet.
4. Â We’re scared of Donald Trump. Â And his hair. Â For obvious reasons.
5.  We’re scared because some people have spent a lot of money telling us that we should be. For some time now, both sides have worked hard to convince us that life as we know it will cease if the other party comes to power.  It’s easy to be frightened of everything after you’ve listened to enough of the chatter.
As someone who has been through depression, anxiety, and a whole lot of therapy, I can pass on the advice of my very wise counselors: nothing will ever scare you as much as the unnamed dread in your mind. Â Once you say something out loud, it loses a lot of its power. Â I found myself worrying, really worrying before the election. Â Finally, I had to fix for myself that I was fretting about whether Mr. Romney might win, because I disagree with a lot – well, most – of the policies he espoused. Â Once I established that fact, I could have a rational conversation with myself. Â (Oxymoron, you say? Â Myself and I disagree.) Â Worst case scenario, he won. Â The chances were good he wouldn’t win both houses, so he wouldn’t be able to do everything he wanted to do. Â If he managed to make some changes I really didn’t like, well, then, I’d get out there and work my butt off to change them back again. Once I looked at it that way, I calmed down.
We are not a nation built of fear, people. Â It’s high time to lose that image. Â In a post-September 11 world, people on both sides of the political divide have taken advantage of our fears to turn us their way. Â If you want to change my mind, convince me why you’re right, not why the other guy is Satan’s long lost brother. Â I’m done being afraid. Â If you want to be, I can’t stop you, but I don’t have to walk down that path by your side.
Now for the quiz. Â Essay question: Â Why do you think the election went the way it did? Â Why are we all so afraid? Â Why doesn’t Donald Trump go away? Â If you have answers, you owe it to all of us to spill it.
Kimberly is still afraid of leprechauns, clowns, and certain fictional characters that show up at theme parks, but that only makes sense. Â
My favorite Democrat of all times, F.D. Roosevelt, once muttered, “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.”
That truly sums up this last election. People on all sides feared what would happen if someone other than their favorite would win. We’d be doomed! We’d lose everything. We’d have another recession. We’d all go straight to hell, tripping over unwanted babies’ bodies as we went.
In all my years, I have never heard such trash talk from mature men and women. The boogiemen were hiding in closets and under beds.
Then along came an horrendous natural disaster.
Somehow, this may actually have turned things around…by giving people something to worry about that was real and pertinent to an entire coastline.
Blue states, red states, we’re really all one big united country, aren’t we? For once, I actually appreciated the Electoral College. Now, there’s another topic for another day.
Well written post. I appreciated it.
Great quote, and very interesting point about the hurricane, Irene. It took the focus from “What might happen?” to “Here’s what has happened – what can I do about it?” Concrete action has a soothing effect on our anxieties.
I’ve always said it would take Godzilla to unite the world. I think Sandy did a pretty good job. Godzilla might be a little too rash….
Well, you know me. I will certainly add my own biased fuel to the fire. You make a great point about fear, and I think that’s at the core of what’s going wrong in our country. It’s an ideological notion that we should not be afraid, but we are. This may sound a little cooky, but it has its roots in religion and in ancient, more civilized, well…civilizations: There are only two motivations for any action we take: love and fear. In the LGBT community, we talk lots about hate and how it’s the opposite of love. But hate is actually the result of fear, as is depression, anxiety, bitterness, arrogance, contempt, emotional pain, and the big one — anger. Other forms of fear are as simple as building four walls to live in so we survive the elements. Having a home means having an income, so when it comes down to it, we even go to work out of fear — fear of not being able to pay the bills.
Love, on the other hand, leads us to show compassion, kindness, acceptance, respect, humility, generosity…the list goes on. We operate from a place of love or fear at nearly every moment of the day. (As soon as I’m done writing this I have to eat because I’m afraid I won’t be hungry for dinner if I wait). The problem is that most of what we do is motivated by fear. I was deeply afraid that Romney was going to win — so much that I quickly forgave Obama of committing any sins I may had faulted him for earlier. And, as I ended up saying (and as you allude to), in the end, I wanted a president who had experience being a president. I was as afraid of change as the conservatives are, but for different reasons. I’m afraid of regression while many of them are immobilized when it comes to moving forward.
Also, I am not insane. Some of their elected leaders are certifiable. It’s not that democrats don’t have their faults, it’s that, for the most part, they don’t make ignorant comments about gays, hurricanes, rape, and vaginas, and women in general. I can’t think of the last time the democrats have had such a series of losers, all partying like it’s 1949.
Even Barbara Walters, an admitted friend of the Donald, said to him — into the camera on live television, and I paraphrase — “Donald, I have a message for you: Stop it. You are hurting yourself and that means you’re hurting me and I am embarrassed by your actions.” (One of the best television moments ever!) Romney, Rove, Trump, and so many other conservatives just lied or demonstrated their ignorance this time around. Rove even accused the democrats of influencing the vote and coercing people to vote against Romney. Karl, that’s not coercing. It’s called campaigning. Certifiably cray-cray.
And when were the democrats last accused of voter tampering? When were we accused of illegal tactics as means to an end? That is the basic difference between the left and right at this point. The right is willing to do whatever it must to achieve the result they believe to be the best thing. You can seldom accuse the democrats of that.
So back to love and fear. I can’t say that I love Obama or the democrats. No one is perfect and neither party has ever come close. But I believe that in our heart of hearts, the democratic party is about progress for this country and we are not afraid of it. And while my vote for a second term was also based on fear of Romney winning, it was because I believe the rest of us operate, for the most part, from a place of love and the attending respect, honor, humility, kindness, generosity, and leadership that the democrats are more inclined to embrace. (And as a side note — if you look at the map, you’ll see that metropolitan counties with universities and a diverse population tend to be blue. What does that tell you?)
To end my quiz: I have been told by a number of republicans, “We are not all like that, you know. Don’t judge me for being a republican.” To which I say, “I’m not judging you, I’m judging the closed-minded, stubbornly ignorant people that you and so many others voted for.”
That’s my two cents. Plus I’m starving now.
Very eloquent, Kevin. You bring up a number of good points. The whole idea of the ends not justifying the means may have to be another blog topic.
This is a great post and all the comments also have me thinking. For myself, you know from reading my blog, I can also get caught up in fear. That said, I have also been angry at the actions of the republicans. Their willingness to change laws that take away the autonomy of women, their willingness to vehemently stand against same sex marriage and laws that protect LGBT Americans, their disregard for VAWA and the people it helps, their extreme laws against immigrants in states like AZ and AL, their vows to get rid of Planned Parenthood and Obamacare day one of Romney being elected…. all scared me. Those things still scare me, BTW. It made me mad because I believe their views/stances promote intolerance, hate, and the taking away of human rights. That’s not what I want for our nation.
I was also appalled by the ignorance of the men in the republican party- making the term “forcible rape” a term that is now used as if all rape weren’t forceable by its very nature, at not allowing the word “vagina” to be used on the Michigan House floor, the whole Sandra Fluke thing and how she was treated… oh and the republican stance on birth control, did I mention that? Geez, it just kept going, so much so that I think women at first were like, look at these silly guys, which then moved to: look at these ignorant men who will take away our rights, rape us and then say it was consensual. And the 47% thing- what was that? Seriously! Okay enough ranting.
I also wasn’t happy with several Obama’s moves, like deporting way too many immigrants, or the targeted killing law, and the drones. But in comparison- there was no comparison. I am also proud that our country has an African American president and believe it shows America is taking steps to right its past. As for Donald Trump, we may be afraid of being fired… and definitely his hair!
Thanks for the post!
Liza Wolff-Francis, Matrifocal Point
I agree, Liza, there was plenty to be afraid of. With people giving us plenty to fear, it’s a great time for a potential leader to step up to the plate and give us something to inspire us, solutions, a better way, instead of just pointing out all the reasons why the other guy is scarier. Not many of them took advantage of that. But no question, there was a lot of scary stuff going on!
Wow – clearly your blog hit a cord with many folks. For me, I love this:
Once you say something out loud, it loses a lot of its power.
I’m so caught up in surviving my day to day right now, don’t have anything intelligent to add to the political discussion….just that I’m am greatly relieved it went the way it did.
Love you, Kim!
Updated results put Obama’s winning percentage at 3.5, with votes still being counted. This puts his win as the 13th closest in our history, according to the Wiki. But I agree, it was relatively close.
To answer your quiz, I believe the President was re-elected for two reasons. First, the President’s team worked the Electoral College system. They focused all of their assets on the dozen or so “states that mattered”. They defined Romney early and often in these states. Romney was never able to mount a serious challenge there, and therefore the entire election was never in doubt.
Secondly, and related to my first point, the country had just suffered the most serious economic crisis and prolonged downturn since the Great Depression. The consensus is that this crisis was caused by greedy and poorly run banks (try asking random folks how they feel about the bank bailouts. Make sure to have protective clothing and possibly a taser). So while the country is still trying to recover from this mess, who do the Republicans nominate? An investment banker. And he really looked good compared to the other choices offered during the nomination process. It’s like the Republicans wrote the 2012 election off. In the end, Romney gave it a good run but I don’t think he ever had a chance to win against a well-run Obama campaign.
Check this post out for some wonky numbery goodness:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/11/29/1165587/-Yup-Romney-couldn-t-get-out-of-mid-40s-in-battlegrounds