As wiser souls than I have stated, “If your vote were not so important, the opposition wouldn’t be working so hard to take it away from you.” When we show up in big numbers, we win. It’s that simple. Don’t let anyone talk you into not voting, or for that matter, voting third party. When I see messaging like that, I always ask “who benefits?” Not you. Not me.
When wealthy pundits in a corporate owned media predict gloom and doom for Democrats no matter how much the Biden/Harris Administration gets accomplished, they are cynically looking for click bait and a meaningless horse race where only they and their rich bosses cash in.
Today’s GOP has shown they are not good at governing. But they are good at branding and the politics of distraction. No, gas prices are not more important than a woman having equal rights over her own person. And now that gas prices have been steadily going down over the last 2 months, what is the next distraction the outrage police will throw at you?
Likewise, chaos agents like Andrew Yang telling you to vote 3rd party, (his so called “Forward Party”) also benefit no one but himself and the campaign bling he is selling without a platform to back it up. Almost all of Yang’s PAC money comes from finance industry billionaires who have given millions to national GOP groups. Who will benefit? (By the way, thanks to CNN’s Jim Acosta for calling out Yang’s complete lack of a platform.)
Please also carefully examine the motives of anyone who professes to be a Democrat or Independent and spends more time bashing Democrats than anyone else. How do they benefit if Democrats lose? It raises their profile as screamers, shaking their fists at the moonlight, but does nothing for us. It only allows destructive people to take power who will not be happy until they send us careening back to the 1950s.
Normally, I’d say vote your conscience, but as GOPers like Ted Cruz recently “fist bumped” and “high-fived” after—temporarily—stopping the #PACTAct that benefits veterans who are burn victims and/or have toxic exposure, this is no time for a spurious “both sides” argument. One side is working to protect a woman’s right to choose, lower insulin costs, fight inflation, make billionaires assume their fair share of the tax burden and just brought the Al Qaeda architect of 9/11 to justice. The other side is behaving horribly at the expense of those they should be protecting for the sole purpose of cruelly denying Democrats a win.
On Tuesday, August 16th, President Biden will sign the Inflation Reduction Act which:
“Expands medicare benefits, lowers energy bills, makes a historical climate investment, lowers health care costs, creates manufacturing jobs, invests in disadvantaged communities, closes tax loopholes used by the wealthy and protects families and small business making $400,000 or less.”
Anyone who says this administration is not getting anything done is playing false with you.
Additionally, Kansas(!) voters decisively rejecting an anti-abortion ballot measure, and the PACTAct getting passed (owing to enormous public pressure and public shaming of GOP Congress/Senate) should tell Democrats they have the wind at our backs. But only if we show up in the huge numbers needed to win.
I hope you will vote accordingly.
