Hillary for President

In the late weeks of the 2004 Presidential campaign, I observed that America’s problems were being aggravated by the “echo chamber effect”: people’s tendency to talk only with people who think pretty much the same as them.

So I decided that what the world really, really needed was for me to express some of my opinions. I began writing email columns and sending them out to people whose email addresses I knew. Eventually I set up an online blog and began posting those articles; they’re still there.

That was over three years ago, and the calendar has turned over a few times. We’re nearing the end of the most hotly-contested Presidential primaries in recent memory. For the first time in many years, the office is wide open: no incumbent President is available to run, no Vice President is running, and both parties have been having very interesting primaries. A few months ago, many fretted that Ohio would be irrelevant in the primaries; now it appears that we will have a meaningful role to play at least in the Democratic primary.

And in the meantime, the campaign of Barack Obama has brought into the political process a lot of people who previously stayed away. The primaries have stimulated a lot more excitement than we’ve seen before, and even in polite society, people are talking about about politics and religion. I’m not sure that the echo chamber is gone, but it’s become less fashionable.

And so – later than I would have liked – I’ll be posting some political thoughts here. Unlike my 2004 and 2006 postings, this is an actual, honest-to-goodness blog, written with real, modern blogging software: so I can invite readers to post their own thoughts and reactions here as well.

Let’s get started. I have come to the conclusion that when I fill out by ballot for the March 4 primary, I’m going to vote for Hillary Clinton. In the columns ahead, I’ll try to explain why I’ll be doing that, and why I think other voters in the Democratic primary should do the same.

And that’s enough for now. The heavy lifting starts in the next column.

Ten Day Wonder

Today, without intending to, I joined the many voters casting the dreaded “provisional ballot” in today’s election. I’m told that this means my vote won’t be counted for ten days; I guess that’s all right, just so long as it counts.

Recent changes in election law have created “no-fault” absentee voting, in which voters can cast absentee ballots without giving a reason. Following a mistake-plagued May primary election, our Board of Elections encouraged Cuyahoga County voters to cast absentee votes rather than wait until Election Day to vote.

So Lynn applied for an absentee ballot, received it, and sent it in well before Election Day. I sent in my own application on October 28, which should have allowed plenty of time for the Board of Elections to mail me my absentee ballot. But legal challenges to Ohio’s voter ID law drew conflicting court rulings, causing election boards to hold onto their absentee ballots for several days to find out whether they needed to put stickers on the envelopes.

The legal decision was finally made on Wednesday, and my absentee ballot arrived on Saturday. By that time the only certain way to make sure my ballot got to the Board of Elections on time was to drop it off, so I figured I might as well wait and vote at our polling place.

I headed over there early this morning, only to learn that once you apply for an absentee ballot the only way you can vote at the polling place is by provisional ballot. Two other voters were filling out provisional ballots while I completed mine, so clearly my experience wasn’t too unusual.

If they are going to encourage voters to vote absentee, I think election officials ought to make it clear that doing so locks voters out from conventional voting. But overall, the experience wasn’t bad. The young poll worker handling provisional ballots was a bit tentative, but it was only 7:30, so I guess that’s not too surprising. I just wish I had waited around to make sure he signed the envelope containing my ballot!

God, guns, and gays

On Tuesday, The Plain Dealer reported on a press conference in which a group of ministers (who use an organizational name but claim they are speaking as individuals) voiced their endorsement of Ken Blackwell for governor. Interested in seeing the original article? Try this link. I sent the following letter to the editor, but so far The Plain Dealer hasn’t shown any indication that they will print it. I figure I’ll publish it here.

Predictions that Kenneth Blackwell’s campaign would focus on “God, guns, and gays” received further confirmation Tuesday in Ted Wendling’s article “Ministers Back Blackwell, Challenge IRS.”

The article quotes Donald Tobin, an OSU expert on tax-exempt organizations, as saying that the ministers spoke as individuals; yet it also identifies them as a a group calling themselves “Clergy for Blackwell.” No one disputes people’s right to form groups: like freedom of religion, freedom of association is protected in the American Constitution. But when they act in concert, specifically attempting to influence their congregations by implying that the Blackwell candidacy is blessed, no one should interpret their speech as individual.

This curious non-group “coalition” of people “speaking as individuals” would remind us all that the candidates’ positions on “abortion, same-sex marriage and placement of the Ten Commandments in public buildings” differ. These are serious issues; but does any thinking Ohioan believe that they have anything to do with Ohio’s present decline and imperiled future?

Mr. Blackwell is quoted as saying that “the flip side of a theocracy is not the secular state. The flip side of a theocracy is religous liberty.” What he conveniently forgets is that centuries of successful experience at home and bitter observation abroad have demonstrated that a secular state is the best protector of religious liberties.

In Matthew’s gospel (22:21), Jesus tells us to “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s.” If we were electing a pastor-in-chief, the clergy’s statements–and The Plain Dealer‘s decision to give them prominent display–might make sense. As it is, we are electing a governor; and the governor’s mansion belongs to Caesar.

Electing a believer to live there is a good idea; electing someone who manipulates believers is not.