Why this independent voter wants Obama to win by a landslide...

In the late nineteenth century a political movement called “Progressivism” began.  From the very beginning it embraced ruthless media coverage of power brokers, anti-trust laws and other regulations, universal suffrage, and labor rights.  But the impetus behind early Progressivism wasn’t a particular set of policy convictions.  Rather, it was the notion that our attitude toward policy should evolve with our society.  What worked yesterday might not work today.  What works today might not work tomorrow.  The only constant for Progressives has been the belief that “what works” must always be defined as “that which allows ordinary Americans to live free”.  Outside of that, though, Progressives believe that what we need in politics is a constant stream of new ideas, not ideologies.

Progressives have been in short supply in presidential elections of late.  Carter probably counts as one.  I’d say Kennedy does as well.  But aside from these notable exceptions, most of the Progressives in the past fifty-or-so years have been found only outside the political machines of the two major parties.  Voters looking for Progressives often don’t belong to a particular political party (or have little loyalty to the ones to which they belong) and find themselves frustrated with the two-party system that has frequently locked Progressives out of the public debate.

I am one such Progressive voter.  For most of my life as an eligible voter, I have gravitated toward Progressive candidates, which means I’ve mostly voted “third party”.  In fact, for me voting for a Progressive candidate has often meant not only support for Progressive policies but also protest against a political system that stifles open discussion of a wider range of issues.

This election I was challenged with an unusual choice.  From what I could tell, there were two adequately Progressive presidential candidates on my ballot.  One was Cynthia McKinney of the Green Party.  The other was Barak Obama of the Democratic Party.

Normally there would be no contest here.  McKinney’s platform was by far more Progressive (in fact, there were some planks that even I didn’t agree with) and she was outside the two-party juggernaut.  Obama, while impressive, clearly had a much less ambitious Progressive agenda, partly evidenced by his “selling out” to the Democratic Party machine.  It was beginning to look like a straight-ticket Green ballot for me.

But then I thought about it a bit more.  I’m one of those voters who knows its nonsense to think you’re “throwing your vote away” if you don’t vote for one of the two major parties, and it’s equally absurd to allow your vote to be swayed by whether or not you think a certain candidate can win.  But when comparing Progressive candidates it does matter to me which candidate will do more for the Progressive movement in the long-run if she or he wins.  When I looked at the candidates this way, it seemed obvious that if McKinney won, her radical proposals would earn her a difficult and unpopular presidency that might sour Americans indefinitely to future Progressive agendas.  Of course, most of her proposals aren’t radical to me.  To me, many of them are very important and likely won’t even get Obama’s attention if he’s president.  But it’s not good enough for certain policies to get attention.  They also have to get implemented.  They also have to stay implemented.  None of McKinney’s policies would get implemented or stay implemented without a general Progressive cultural shift among the electorate that I’m fairly certain she would not be able to inspire.

But Obama has already inspired a Progressive shift, and it’s looking likely he’ll be able to maintain that momentum for a very long time.  While Obama’s agenda isn’t as Progressive as I’d like, the cultural change he’s inspiring can make it likely that more ambitious Progressives will be heard in the not-too-distant future.  And, to me, that would be a very good thing.

Now, the truth is that this rationale alone wasn’t enough for me to cast my vote for a guy who looked like he was going to win just fine without it.  But another point worthy of consideration was this:  The bigger Obama’s win, the greater the benefit to Progressives in general.  In fact, my observation was that a near-win on Obama’s part wouldn’t give Progressives nearly the momentum they'd need to set the political agenda for the foreseeable future.  A landslide victory for Obama is critical, then, for Progressives everywhere.  This realization finally moved me to vote for Obama yesterday (in Iowa’s early voting).

Of course, I did vote Green everywhere else but in the presidential race.  But with many other Progressively-minded people across the US, I decided that right now, when it comes to the White House, Obama is our best hope.