I don’t
hide the fact that I am a rather partisan person when it comes to politics.
However, in my life, there are instances when I have broken with party lines
and voted for another candidate. Granted, there has to be darn good reason to
do so but it has happened and I believe that I made the right choice at the
time. There are people in this country that are ardent supporters of one party
over another regardless of the actions of the candidates… welcome to
California!
Back
in March, anti-gun California State Senator Leland Yee (D) was arrested by the FBI on corruption and bribery charges. Unfortunately, it is not surprising
these days to hear such charges being leveled on a politician. However, what
made this case unique and rather disturbing is the fact that the anti-gun
legislator, who has attached his name to nearly every anti-gun piece of
legislation since he took office, was also arrested by the FBI on charges of
conspiring to illegally import and distribute firearms, allegedly including
machine guns and “rocket launchers”. Since that time additional details
have surfaced. Specifically, he was arrested for conspiring with the Chinese
mafia (Triads) to import and sell full-auto rifles and rocket launchers (I
wonder if any of them were “ghost guns”). The full warrant
affidavit can be read here.
This
week, Leland Yee was back in the news. Mr. Yee, supposedly possessing either
the worst memory or biggest balls in history, was running for Secretary of
State. This is not a punch line, this is reality. I heard about this some time
ago and, like many law abiding gun owners, I was confident that no one would
vote for such a criminal. Well, like many times before, I underestimated the
stupidity and partisanship of many voters. Leland Yee collected nearly ten percent of the vote in the California primary. This translates to a third place
finish with 300,425 Californians who decided that legal firearms are bad but
illegal guns are perfectly acceptable.
Results
such as this really bring to light that not all the issues in politics can be
blamed on the politicians themselves, it all comes down to the voters. This isn’t
a new problem, this has been a part of politics since the beginning when
politicians realized that they had four primary ways of running a campaign: run
an honest race and position yourself as the best person for the job; manipulate
the perceptions of the voters and attack your competition; use your celebrity
status (entertainment, sports, politics, etc.) to garner popularity votes; or,
run for office in a place where your party is guaranteed to win by blind party
vote. The first has long since withered away while the other three strategies
are what have taken root in this country. This is why it really doesn't matter if you are an adulterer (happy belated 50th birthday to Monica Lewinsky), left someone to die after driving your car off a bridge, you are an arms trafficker, or your biggest accomplishment is finishing second on American Idol... you still have a chance to be elected.
A
blind vote is supporting the Political SNAFU that we all despise. While I don’t
think this is ever going to go away, we should at least do all we can to stunt
it’s growth by educating ourselves as to the candidates that are running,
knowing who is currently representing us, and giving a crap about the decisions
that these people are making in office. While we may all have opinions as to whether
their actions are good, bad, right, or wrong, we should take those policies,
actions, and charges into account before we pull that lever or hit that button.
I am not against voting along party lines so long as you know who you are
voting for.
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