Single-Issue Voting: The Virus Spreads To Our Own Family

By BlackJack

The question hanging over the heads of Democratic activists the past many years has been a simple one without a clear answer - how do we get Americans to vote in their own best interest. The conservative right, and it's media machine, have done such a good job of convincing America, especially the rural Christian voter, of voting on issues that have no direct effect on their daily lives.

Promoting a fear campaign of gay marriage, gun ownership and faceless terrorism has swayed voters to time and again elect representation that leans towards policy that benefits big-money America while leaving the working and middle-class voter out in the cold. Fearing that bands of gay anti-gun terrorists will begin roaming small-town U.S.A. has given us the politics of Bush's (or maybe Rove's) America.

Farmers have elected Senators who, upon swearing-in, immediately went about the business of destroying the family farm and promoting the agenda of "Con-Agra-culture". Church-going Americans have elected Representatives who dismantle the very social programs that would benefit Christ's children - the poor and disadvantaged who live in the shadows of our great nation. Patriots have elected both men and women who went about crippling our Constitutional rights, all the while telling us they were doing it to protect us from "terrorists" - while they wiretap our "liberal" Pastors and infiltrate our peace groups looking for the "evil doers" at the local Starbucks.

Now the single-issue voting virus seems to be spreading to the Democrats as well. In the past three months it has become abundantly clear. The left-leaning National Organization for Women (NOW) is asking it's members to "Demand Substance NOT Sexism" in a national campaign to promote the candidacy of Hillary Clinton, not because she represents the views of the organization but primarily because she is, indeed, a woman. Not conversely, many respected black leaders have endorsed the candidacy of Barack Obama (just as many Hispanic leaders endorsed former-candidate Bill Richardson) primarily on the pretext that Senator Obama does, indeed, have a dark complexion.

My fear, and the fear of many free-thinkers who have battled this disease the past few years, is that we as a party will fall prey to the single-issue voting that has caused so much harm in the past several elections. I hope that we will take the time to understand the platforms of each candidate and find the one that seems to represent ALL of their values - including the way they run their campaigns.

There are many ways we may emulate the organization and success of the conservatives in recent elections, but stooping to fear-mongering and single-issue voting shouldn't be one of them.