{"id":5747,"date":"2016-10-27T06:00:07","date_gmt":"2016-10-27T12:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/johnbeckett\/?p=5747"},"modified":"2016-10-26T19:22:56","modified_gmt":"2016-10-27T01:22:56","slug":"the-tactics-and-strategy-of-bad-choices","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/johnbeckett\/2016\/10\/the-tactics-and-strategy-of-bad-choices.html","title":{"rendered":"The Tactics and Strategy of Bad Choices"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Last Thursday I posted my 2016 voter\u2019s guide<\/a> where I encouraged everyone to vote for Hillary Clinton. On Monday, John Halstead asked Who Do You Vote For at the (Beginning of the) End of the World?<\/a> and said he was voting for Jill Stein. I think John\u2019s analysis is spot-on, but his conclusion is flawed. He wants to \u201csend a message\u201d \u2013 a message that won\u2019t be heard, and a message that could make a bad situation even worse.<\/p>\n

\"cornfield<\/a>This election reminds me of some of the less-happy portions of my childhood.<\/p>\n

My mother has always said I was born 35. I was a very mature child and I hated being a child \u2013 I hated the powerlessness and I hated the \u201cchoices\u201d that weren\u2019t really choices. \u201cYou can go to church or you can not watch TV all week.\u201d \u201cYou can sit in class without making a sound or you can go to the principal\u2019s office.\u201d \u201cYou can cut the grass or you can\u2026\u201d We won\u2019t talk about what that \u201cchoice\u201d was. You don\u2019t have to think very hard.<\/p>\n

Some of these were reasonable demands that deep down I knew were reasonable even though I was 8 or 9 years old and even though I really didn\u2019t want to do them. Some of them weren\u2019t. What annoyed me \u2013 what enraged me \u2013 was the powerlessness of my situation. I could make the \u201cright\u201d choice and suffer a little, or I could make the \u201cwrong\u201d choice and suffer a lot. There was no choice that did not involve suffering.<\/p>\n

One day when I was an early teenager and starting to feel a little more confident, I pushed back (just a bit) on my father: \u201cwhy do I have to [do whatever it was that I didn\u2019t want to do]?\u201d He snapped back \u201cI\u2019m trying to teach you responsibility.\u201d My father\u2019s idea of responsibility \u2013 forged as one of eight children growing up in the Great Depression \u2013 was very different from mine. After all these years, it still is.<\/p>\n

But all those choices that weren\u2019t really choices did teach me something. They taught me to think tactically and strategically at the same time.<\/p>\n

If the \u201cchoice\u201d is between suffering a little or suffering a lot, I\u2019m going to choose suffering a little. Those are tactics \u2013 the short-term actions that deal with the immediate situation. But I\u2019m also going to do everything I can to put myself in a better situation so that at some point, I\u2019m not powerless and I don\u2019t have to make bad choices. That\u2019s the strategy \u2013 get to a better situation.<\/p>\n

At 9 or 10 years old, I realized this was going to be a long process. Going away to college was the long-term goal \u2013 doing what was necessary to make that a reality was the plan. Looking back on those years, I had the same interests, passions, distractions, and teenage angst that everyone else had. But rarely if ever did I allow a short-term consideration to get in the way of the long-term goal, much less jeopardize it.<\/p>\n

It worked. When I look back on everything that happened, I can see there was a lot of magic involved. And some hard work and some good fortune, but also a lot of magic.<\/p>\n

\"07<\/a><\/p>\n

Fast forward to 2016. There is no good choice in the race for President. While I support Hillary Clinton I preferred Bernie Sanders, and even he was far from perfect. There is a bad choice and there is a worse choice.<\/p>\n

Jill Stein has no more chance of becoming President than I had of running away from home at age nine and becoming a lab assistant at Castle Frankenstein. Voting for her may make you feel like you \u201csent a message\u201d but the only political messages from individuals that are heard involve checks with lots of zeros on them.<\/p>\n

Voting for Hillary is a tactical decision to choose less suffering instead of the more suffering that Trump would bring. But that\u2019s not the whole story, just like my childhood story to go along with the \u201cproper\u201d choices wasn\u2019t the whole story of my life. There is also a strategic decision to make sure we have real choices in the future.<\/p>\n

I frequently disagree Cara Schulz<\/a> on political matters. I\u2019m a liberal, she\u2019s a libertarian: what else would you expect? But she\u2019s not just complaining about bad choices \u2013 she\u2019s working tirelessly to promote Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson and to build the Libertarian Party. And she\u2019s running for city council in Burnsville, MN. Those are strategic efforts.<\/p>\n

Gary Johnson is polling much better than Jill Stein, but he still has no chance of winning. As I write this, 538 says<\/a> he should expect to get 5.6% of the popular vote and win 0.1 electoral votes. That raises awareness of the Libertarian Party but doesn\u2019t accomplish much else.<\/p>\n

Winning city council elections accomplishes something. Winning school board elections accomplishes something. Winning state legislature races really accomplishes something. And in order to win, someone has to run, and a bunch of other someones have to give money and time to the campaign. Real change is built from the ground up.<\/p>\n

I have some cynical friends who like to say \u201cvoting doesn\u2019t accomplish anything\u201d or \u201cif voting accomplished anything they\u2019d make it illegal.\u201d They\u2019re wrong. Voting does accomplish something \u2013 it just doesn\u2019t accomplish nearly enough.<\/p>\n

Too many of us want to elect the \u201cright\u201d President who will fix everything. That\u2019s the appeal of Donald Trump among right-wing Republicans \u2013 they want a strongman who will put things back the way they\u2019re supposed to be (and those Trump supporters aren\u2019t all racists \u2013 if we don\u2019t address their concerns, the 2020 Republican candidate will be even worse).<\/p>\n

But Barack Obama couldn\u2019t fix everything. Bill Clinton couldn\u2019t fix everything. Hillary Clinton won\u2019t be able to fix everything. A savior isn\u2019t coming<\/a>. I hate to sound like a Libertarian, but there are some things government just can\u2019t fix \u2013 we\u2019re going to have to do those things ourselves, individually and in our local communities.<\/p>\n

But Barack Obama, for all his shortcomings, has been a better President than John McCain and Mitt Romney would have been. Bill Clinton was a better President than George Bush or Bob Dole. And Hillary Clinton will be a far, far better President than Donald Trump. Make the less painful tactical choice.<\/p>\n

Then make some solid strategic choices. Find good, competent, compassionate, progressive state and local candidates and support them. Build the kind of local community you want to live in. Be prepared to keep it up year after year, election cycle after election cycle. Big ships can\u2019t turn on a dime \u2013 240 year old countries with 320 million people can\u2019t change quickly either.<\/p>\n

And never forget this is a capitalist society. Every dollar you spend \u2013 or give away \u2013 is a vote for what you want to stay the same and what you want to change. Sometimes there are no good choices here either\u00a0\u2013 think both tactically and strategically here too.<\/p>\n

Ironically, some of people who are doing the most strategic work (more than I\u2019m doing, anyway) are also the ones advocating choosing more suffering by either not voting or voting for a candidate with no chance to win. This increases the chance that the \u201cworse\u201d candidate will defeat the \u201cbad\u201d candidate and make their work even harder, not to mention more painful.<\/p>\n

This doesn\u2019t surprise me \u2013 doing the long, hard work of creating change requires passion, and passionate people rarely have the patience to go along with candidates, policies, and plans that don\u2019t directly advance their cause. But sometimes that\u2019s the most effective approach.<\/p>\n

As I said in my Voter\u2019s Guide post, vote your conscience. If your conscience tells you to vote for Jill Stein, then vote for Jill Stein and I\u2019ll respect your choice. But I still think it\u2019s a sub-optimal choice and a more painful tactical decision than necessary.<\/p>\n

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If your conscience tells you to vote for Jill Stein, then vote for Jill Stein and I\u2019ll respect your choice. But I still think it\u2019s a sub-optimal choice and a more painful tactical decision than necessary.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1129,"featured_media":5753,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[272],"tags":[1164,584,725,1135,1095,1165,304,4,5],"class_list":["post-5747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community-2","tag-bad-choices","tag-cara-schulz","tag-donald-trump","tag-gary-johnson","tag-hillary-clinton","tag-jill-stein","tag-john-halstead","tag-pagan","tag-paganism"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Tactics and Strategy of Bad Choices<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"If your conscience tells you to vote for Jill Stein, then vote for Jill Stein and I\u2019ll respect your choice. 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