Courtney Milan: And just to be clear, this isn’t about people who are not voting for a candidate because their conscience won’t allow it. That is also a thing people are allowed to do, and normalize letting people vote (or not) the dictates of their conscience.

People vote for candidates that they don’t like. If your rule is “no, you also have to like them, and I will angrily insist you do so” you are telling people they shouldn’t vote for a candidate they don’t like. Nobody has to like a politician.

You’re not going to make them like the candidate. You’re just going to make them dislike you.

It is fully okay to vote for the NLRB board being able to protect unions and the FTC to keep all our grocery stores from being owned by the same entity. You don’t have to like the goddamn candidate.

It doesn’t mean I’m planning on “sitting this out” or that I think that my dislike for Candidate Y means I think Candidate Y is “just as bad as” Fash McFascist. I didn’t like Hillary and I worked for her campaign for 20+ hours a week because I knew Trump posed a bigger threat than people thought.

Normalize being okay with people not having parasocial relationships with politicians and nonetheless doing the work.

And just to be clear, this isn’t about people who are not voting for a candidate because their conscience won’t allow it. That is also a thing people are allowed to do, and normalize letting people vote (or not) the dictates of their conscience.

Favorite quote on subject: “If you are part of a society that votes, then do so. There may be no candidates and no measures you want to vote for...but there are certain to be ones you want to vote against. In case of doubt, vote against. By this rule you will rarely go wrong.” ― Robert A. Heinlein

Heinlein is not exactly a great moralist though.

I consider this to be in the "A blind squirrel can get caught in a clock, stopping it, making it right twice a day, until a carrion eater has a meal, demonstrating the circle of life and the necessity of fixing public infrastructure." set of Heinlein quotes: Correct, but only incidentally so.

True; and as a bonus, it confuses some Libertarians as well.

I would dearly love to see how the inside of his mind worked, cause holy crap that had to be a sight

Broken clock. Twice a day.

So very true.

What I care about in politicians is honesty, competence, and policy. I do not have to like the politician as an individual.

Or even love all their policy. But especially for President, you are voting for compromise with some unsavory ideas and so it’s never going to be “all you want.” It’s always going to feel- meh

100%

I will knock on them for not voting rest of the ballot however. Fine, you utterly despise and cannot in good conscience vote for a particular candidate. Skip over that race and pay attention to props/measures/transit/utility/parks/libraries/bonds others items on ballot. That stuff has impact.

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