Look, I've voted in every midterm and presidential election since 1990, the first year I was eligible.
I wish there was a president I wanted to vote for this year, but I sure as hell want to vote against Project 2025.
TBH, you are underselling Biden's record (and buying into the GOP narrative). His Administration has been dealing with crisis after crisis and doing it well. Covid/NATO/Ukraine (with bonus preventing China/Taiwan) /Climate positive infrastructure /runaway inflation/An idiotic Supreme Ct/Monopolies..
A Vote **for** Biden/Harris is a vote to fix the Supreme Court, for the best Climate policy we've ever had, for Ukraine/NATO, for tearing down monopoly power, for Health care/Social Security & Medicare, for lower deficits and fiscal responsibility. This list goes on - Biden is getting sh*t done.
I agree with all of this except the COVID policy which could be better; however I'm heartbroken that we're enabling genocide in Palestine and it takes the shine off the rest of it for me right now.
I'm still going to vote for him because of all those other reasons, and also because fascists.
re: Israel/Palestine,it's a very fine line there. Netanyahu & Hamas wanted this, and it would be nice to cut them both off, Israel is the most important ally in the region, philosophically (women's rights!) and strategically. IMHO, Biden is doing about as well as possible w/bad actors everywhere.
PS the bad actors include a LOT of folks in the US (AIPAC, GOP,etc). While we haven't been perfect in this, I do think that this will be awful until both Netanyahu and Hamas are out of power and that w/o US support, this will be full out war in the region (bad for everyone!). Hezbollah wants it too.
And in the back of my mind, I know Netanyahu has nukes, and if the US ceases support, the fighting will increase (see Hezb., other war-mongering zealots), and Netanyahu turns to China/Russia for support or may end up using those nukes (He's that awful) as the fighting expands to war. No good options
Me, too, since 1988, and nothing but a rightward march for my effort, ugh. So, I get the feeling voting doesn't do anything. There's other political action that must be considered and employed.
Don't forget the victories, and the fact that we have to defend things like same-sex marriage and more-available healthcare. If it weren't for Obamacare, as a self-employed person and cancer survivor, I would be bankrupt right now.
Pay attention to your state and local races. Those are often determined by a handful of votes, and these are the people standing between you and poor federal-level decisions
you need to do a lot more than vote for the top of the ticket every 4 years to effect change. But that does not mean that voting for the top of the ticket every 4 years is useless; it's just the least we can do, while still claiming involvement. Not voting is nihilism.
I started with a school referendum 3 weeks after the general in 1987 (that was a chore to get registered for, given my birthday landed in between) and first presidential was 1988.
And right there with you.
Negative partisanship era. Thankfully the Republicans didn’t publish an actual platform and outsourced it to Project 2025 instead, and there is A LOT to neg in there.
