To Vote Or Not To Vote

Let’s Just Get it Over With, Shall We?
By Doug Patton
July 28, 2008

Two schools of thought seem to prevail among conservative Republicans unhappy with the prospect of voting for John McCain. First, there are those who believe that McCain, though far from their first choice, is looking better and better as the campaign progresses, primarily because the alternative is totally unacceptable. Then there are those think that the Republic can survive a Barack Obama administration, especially if it ushers in another Ronald Reagan era.

Those believing in the former rightly point to Supreme Court nominations, tax policy and national security as some of their primary concerns. Their belief is that while McCain is wrong on global warming, wrong on immigration, wrong on free speech issues such as campaign finance reform, he is still infinitely better than Obama on many of the biggest issues.

The latter group believes that while Obama will appoint extremely liberal Supreme Court justices, those on the court most likely to retire are also liberal, thereby netting the Left nothing. This theory neglects to acknowledge the fact that Obama would be replacing eighty-something-year-old liberals with fifty-something-year-old liberals on the high court. It also fails to take into account that the president of the United States appoints hundreds of lower court judges during the course of four or eight years. We are still suffering under the hair-brained rulings of Jimmy Carter’s judicial appointees.

Add to those concerns the specter of crippling tax increases, crushing gas prices and a smothering nanny state, combined with the distinct possibility of terrorist attacks on a scale we could not have previously imagined, and the election of Barack Obama becomes a recipe for disaster.

And yet…and yet…

I resist the thought of an Obama presidency with everything that is in me. He is a radical on virtually every domestic and foreign policy issue you can name. He would appoint people to our courts who would continue the American slide into the gutter of moral relativism. He would surrender in Iraq and otherwise be a bungling commander-in-chief. He would meddle in every aspect of our lives and tax everything that means anything to us.

And yet I find myself wondering if it is a necessary evil. I cringe at the thought of listening to all the whining from those who will say the election was stolen if Obama loses. It might be worth four years of Obama in order to put Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton out of business. Imagine no more excuses for the lies these two have been telling for the last thirty years. Imagine no more affirmative action. After all, if a black man can make it to the presidency, why is preferential treatment any longer necessary?

I find myself dreaming of a day when wide-eyed idealists on the left — especially African-Americans — who see their political salvation in this guy, will come to realize that a black man or woman can be every bit as incompetent and dangerous as a white man or woman with the same misguided worldview.

Many of us prayed for a J.C. Watts presidency or its equivalent. I personally hoped in 2000 that George W. Bush would pick Watts as his running mate. Had he done so, imagine how different this election year would be. The first serious black presidential candidate would be a conservative Republican whose election would truly have put the lie to the charge that white America won’t vote for a black man for president.

But that did not happen, and we find ourselves in 2008 with a European-style socialist knocking at the White House door. Perhaps it is time to put this race thing behind us once and for all. His presidency will be an unmitigated disaster. Perhaps it is time. Perhaps the only way to put this myth of ongoing systemic, institutional racism in America is to elect a black man and just get it over with.

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© Copyright 2008 by Doug Patton
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Doug Patton is a freelance columnist who has served as a political speechwriter and public policy advisor. His weekly columns are published in newspapers across the country and on selected Internet web sites, including Human Events Online, TheConservativeVoice.com and GOPUSA.com, where he is a senior writer and state editor. Readers may e-mail him at mhtml:%7BB5A5E0E5-09A7-4E7E-ABCC-097CA314DBE1%7Dmid://00000091/!x-usc:mailto:dougpatton@cox.net.