A former student e-mailed me today with a reminder of days gone past. This student worked as a counselor for me at a summer media camp I directed on campus for high schoolers.
“It’s hard to believe,” my former student wrote, “only four years ago that we were at journalism camp and you were trying to remember the name of the Illinois state senator with the odd name who gave that electric keynote speech at the convention. I went home after camp ended and looked up the red state/blue state speech and thought about how great it would be if Obama ran for president one day. Just thought I’d share.”
When I watched that speech, I admit, I was both mesmerized by Obama’s public speaking skills and his message, but I was also completely disgusted by the mere fact that the Democrats were trotting out their Poster Boy for Political Correctness.
But that was also the summer my disillusionment with the Bush administration was really starting to fray the edges of my political worldview. Part of me was still in denial about that.
By fall, I would walk into the voting booth a deeply conflicted man. I didn’t want to vote for John Kerry–the Republican in me felt revulsion at the mere idea–but I couldn’t vote for George Bush, either. I felt as though he had betrayed me, the party, and the philosophy of “Compassionate Conservatism” that had drawn me to his banner in the first place.
In the end, I didn’t vote for either man, but I did vote against one of them.
I will be far less troubled when I cast my vote today.
Related posts (automated):
- Election Reflection I: “Early” voting
- Election Reflection III: Does Every Vote Count?
- Election Reflection V: Blue States and…Gray States?
- Election Reflection IV: The Waiting is the Hardest Part
- Palin’s RNC speech leaked to Web
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I too cast a vote against a candidate in 2004. It’s something that I really don’t like doing, but sometimes that’s all you can do.
Besides, when I can’t vote for Cthulhu (“Why settle for the lesser evil?”), I might as well settle for the lesser of evils.