Obama, the Great Black Hope (and, apparently, a Great Hope for many whites who consider themselves anti-war), cannot plausibly claim the “peace candidate” mantle while simultaneously serving as a member in good standing of the club that lobbies for ever-increasing military budgets.
Obama has definitively chosen guns over bread, bullets over butter. The money is already earmarked for the generals and admirals and defense contractors, with his signature prominently affixed.
In a sense, the election is over, since all the “viable” candidates are members of the Military Spending Club. None of Clinton’s or Obama’s promises for urban revitalization, infrastructure repair, real health care reform, vastly increased federal aid to schools or affordable housing can be taken seriously so long as they support a bloated Pentagon.
Garret expresses his "feeling that Obama will work with the overwhelmingly Democratic Congress he will have during his first term to correct the FISA mistake and several other Bush-era edicts.”
Under Garrett’s construct, however, it doesn’t matter how one might feel. What matters is past conduct. And past conduct shows Obama finds it politically expedient to forsake the Consitution and specifically, the Fourth Amendment.
In this case, it's not really even about choosing the lesser evil because Obama has such a stellar record. It's more about not getting your first choice. If you were a Hillary supporter, or if you wish Dennis Kucinich could win, or Ron Paul, or Cynthia McKinney, or Bob Barr - there's not much to complain about in Obama. People are upset that their preferred candidate cannot win, and yet they would waste their vote because they can't have their first choice. They would risk everything that could happen in a Bush third term because they can't have their way, exactly the way they want it. Like a child throwing a tantrum because Mommy said he couldn't get the big bag of Cheetos and has to settle for the small bag. Instead of being reasonable and accepting the small bag, he ends up getting nothing for acting like a spoiled brat.
The Bush administration was a perfect storm that happened because the right people from the right background who had been working together on the right and laying the groundwork for the future were all brought into this administration. Neither McCain nor Obama will have the same people the Bush administration had, which gave Bush the power to roll back liberty and fight terrorists in the name of so-called freedom.
Whether a third term of Bush happens does not rest on electing McCain or Obama but rather it rests on whether or not either candidate will find it politically expedient to reject the “war on terror”, end it, and reverse Middle East policy.
As for the Cheetos, Americans haven’t been able to eat Cheetos for eight years now and are hungry so a big bag is more appealing than a small bag. It’s especially appealing because the large bag is on sale right now for 99 cents and costs less per ounce than the small bag.
Americans have been settling for the small bag for far too long. Each election they settle for one. But, when they don’t get any more Cheetos in between elections, it gets more and more difficult to settle for a small one during elections.
Mr. Garrett brings his essay to a close by exclaiming that if people vote third party or Independent (somebody who “can’t win”) his “family will have to face the horrors of nuclear war, an expanded fascist police state, and a government that is more controlled by huge corporations and special interest lobbyists than ever before” and it will “cost Obama the election and gave John McCain the keys to the White House and nuclear launch codes.”
Such fearmongering does not work because he set up a “lesser evils” argument that personal perceptions are not a good enough indication of how we or another might act.
Only past conduct can be used to determine what kind of a "lesser evils" candidate McCain or Obama really is.
McCain has been anti-torture, he challenged Boeing and the bloated military budget, and worked for campaign finance reform, and his past conduct indicates he could strengthen international law and work on nuclear non-proliferation effectively since he co-sponsored the Iran-Iraq Non-Proliferation Act with Al Gore.
Seems like McCain couldn't be that bad. But, I think in order for Garrett's argument to work he has to be that bad or else the "lesser evils" argument is weak.
Right now, McCain is foaming at the mouth with rhetoric to wet the appetites of the voters he expects to elect him. Who knows if he really agrees with what he is saying? He’s playing the game of politics.
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