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Most of us vote viscerally rather than rationally. Aristotle, in his great work on rhetoric, said that there are three ways to persuade an audience: Logos (appeal to reason), Pathos (appeal to emotion), and Ethos (appeal based on the character of the speaker--what the political and advertising world has for some time been calling "image"). In any American political campaign, Pathos and Ethos have always played the largest roles. We want our candidates to be able to state their positions reasonably and to back them up with facts and examples (and, for many, in the recent campaign Sarah Palin failed miserably in this regard), but mostly we want them to succor us with hope (here Barack Obama played us well) and sell us on themselves (and here both Obama and Palin managed to seduce many with their magnetism, charisma, and charm, while John McCain and Joe Biden were for the most part either bland or downright off-putting). We bear the monotony of a debate in hopes that a candidate will suddenly inject us with something from the bag of Dr. Feel Good or commit a gaffe of some kind that will enable us to dismiss him/her. The purely rational voter does not, could not, probably should not, exist. However, believing that voters' choices and expectations should be more rational than they usually are, I offer the following suggestions.
After the presidential candidates for the two major parties are nominated in the summmer of 2012, they will make public their responses to this questionnaire.
1. I am qualified to be President of the United States because I have been a...(check all that apply):
One-term U.S. President
U.S. Vice President
Member of Congress
State Governor
State Legislator
Businessperson
Military Leader
War Hero
Sports Hero
Movie Star
Scholar
Artist
Scientist
Other (be specific)
My experience in this/these roles has qualified me to be President because...(limit explanation to fewer than 200 words).
2. (T or F) I can work amicably with people of all races, religions, philosophies, temperaments, political persuasions, ages, professions, economic classes, and levels of education.
(T or F) I do my best to see all sides of an issue before I make a decision.
3. I believe in (check all that apply; do not attempt to explain or qualify your position--you can do that on the campaign trail or in the debates)
A strict interpretation of the Constitution
Redistributing wealth through progressive taxation
Universal health insurance
Unilateralism in international relations
Tariffs, farm subsidies, and other forms of economic protectionism
Strong unions
Government bailout of failing financial institutions
Pre-emptive war
Nation building
An aggressive program to explore outer space
Substantially paying down the national debt
Expanding the Strategic Defense Initiative (missile shields)
Affirmative action
A guest worker program
Amnesty for illegal immigrants
Strict separation of church and state
Abortion
The war on drugs
High school graduation being contingent upon passing a state or national exam
Gay marriage
Privatizing social security
Two years required national service for both sexes between ages 18-25
Subsidized post-high school education for military enlistees
Requiring all U.S. car manufacturers to achieve a fleet average of 40 m.p.g. by 2014
Vastly expanding the search for gas and oil on federally owned lands
Aggressively combatting global warming because it is a serious and essentially man-made problem
(The results of these checklists would be printed and included as a separate sheet with all voter ballots for the November election.)
4. As they get into their fall campaigns, the candidates may spend as much money as they wish, from whatever sources they can tap, but--as a reality check for both themselves and the electorate--whether in a campaign speech or an official debate, for each program they say they wish to develop or action they say they wish to take, they will be required to state how much it will cost, where specifically the money will come from, and/or what existing program will be cut (and to what extent) in order to support it. Failure to do so will cost the candidate's campaign fund $1,000,000 for each offense.
II. Swing Vote
Consider: The Kevin Costner film Swing Vote has the U.S. presidential election coming down to a decision made by one man. It's an entertaining film with an entertaining thought--one vote can swing an election--that loses its validity when it's seriously entertained. One vote to determine a public election, whether for dog catcher or U.S. President? Not only not bloody likely but the next thing to impossible.
Consider: In a recent Leonardo DiCaprio commercial urging people to vote in the 2008 election, Harrison Ford says, "537 people decided the 200 election, and you want to tell me that one vote doesn't count?" Yes, Harrison, I do want to tell you that. You're off by 536 votes. In the case you cited--and in practically all recorded cases in American history--in a strictly literal, rational sense (that is, determining the outcome), any one given vote does not matter. Whether a candidate wins by two or two million makes no difference. Only if the win is by one does the vote matter. Further, not one of the losing votes matters at all--if none of them had been cast, the result would be the same.
Consider: When Ronald Reagan was elected president in 1980, there was a serious fuss about TV networks projecting winners even before the polls on the west coast had closed. The projections deterred some westerners from voting because they concluded (quite rationally) that their vote didn't matter. (That there were other races and issues to be voted on in that election is true but not relevant to this point.) The networks had pulled the curtain away from Oz and exposed an illusion.
So why vote if you don't make a direct difference? There actually is one rational reason. Aggregate numbers do matter. Your vote, when added to those of voters like you, gives everyone a sense of the winner's strength. A landslide suggests a mandate authorizing the "ins" to push their agenda hard. A narrow win (but always, of course, by more than one vote!) is a caution. But more importantly (and here we're back to Pathos), we should vote because it feels good to have done so: we've done our civic duty, we've tipped our cap to democracy, we feel briefly united with our fellow citizens (sometimes even the ones who are voting the other way), we have expressed an opinion without hurting anyone, we have vented.
If you don't vote, the saying goes, you deserve the government you get. On the other hand, if you do vote, you also deserve the government you get (how could it be otherwise in a democracy?). So logically, it's win/win, with those who vote winning just a little more because they have been visited, however temporarily, by Dr. Feel Good.
III. Living in Spin
Did Barack Obama pal around with William Ayers? Did Sarah Palin improperly influence the firing of a state trooper? Did John McCain improperly intervene on behalf of Charles Keating? Did George Bush shirk his duty in the National Guard? Did Bill Clinton have sex with Monica Lewinsky? Did Hillary Clinton have a conflict of interest in representing the Rose Law Firm? Did John Edwards father a child out of wedlock? Was Larry Craig guilty of lewd conduct in a men's restroom? Did Ted Stevens conceal improper gifts and lie about it?
To the true believers, it doesn't really matter. With a little help from party publicists and those media pundits who are on our side, we'll turn it our way. When our favorites are accused of sin, we'll go through the four stages of spin.
Stage 1--We assert that the claim is totally unfounded. It not only didn't happen, it could not possibly have happened. Unthinkable. Our witch-hunting opposition is on a fishing expedition (and don't accuse us of mixing metaphors, either, you self-appointed scolds).
Stage 2--We concede that it might possibly have happened but insist that it didn't happen the way our favorite's critics allege that it happened, that the incident has been blown terribly out of proportion, and that the remarks of our favorite in regard to the issue have either been misquoted or taken completely out of context.
Stage 3--We admit that the incident happened but insist that what our favorite did or said wasn't really wrong, was an understandable slip, no big deal, we're all human, you know, nobody's perfect, and besides, your guy/gal is just as bad, let's look at some of his/her sins.
State 4--Okay, we say with a shrug, it happened, and it was wrong, and we can't justify it--but we don't really care because, no matter what he/she has done or said, we still like our guy/gal way better than your guy/gal!
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