Confessions of an Undecided Voter

I never expected to be here at this point. It feels weird.

We were raised to understand voting as a responsibility and a sacred duty, a mark of maturity and adulthood.

In civics we learned of the three branches of government and how We The People would decide who would make the laws and lead the nation.

We were told we too were supposed to participate in this grand experiment called American democracy. One person, one vote, whoever receives the most votes wins. We play-acted this democratic tradition as children, voting for class president or representatives on student council.

But something seemed amiss about the whole process even then. While the winner was supposed to go the most competent student with the smartest ideas who would work hardest, how often would the popular athlete with the hottest charisma triumph instead?

But that was just childhood. Adults are supposed to be different. The grown-up world seemed so serious and smart looking upward from that spot down on the carpet.

And as we passed from childhood into adolescence, we came to discover just how serious these "issues" were that the grown-ups debated about with such passion and enthusiasm on those TV shows.

They talked about if we should go to war. They talked about if the government should try some new program that could cost a whole lot of money but maybe help a whole lot of people. They talked about if prisoners should be executed or stay in jail for all their lives.

And it was all so serious and important and if you were to be serious and important you had to know all about it too and decide what you would say and which party you would join.

But that was decades ago, a fuzzy nostalgia fading like an old VHS tape watched too many times.

I'm only 40 years old but most days feel like an 80-year-old man blowing rings of smoke.

This world of adults and serious issues and mature policy discussions, where politics used to be an authentically boring subject for geeks and nerds, before it became a 24/7 preoccuption for the masses—where did it go? Will it ever return? Did we really not know just how good we had it compared to today’s endless servings of bullshit?

At least three or four times a month, this deep feeling comes over me again, one of those realizations that I try to push away, but still entertain in a somewhat subversive, masochistic sense:

This whole career of political writing and activism has been one big fucking mistake.

I should never have signed up for those first few political science classes and certainly not have made it a second major. I should have just stayed focused on my Creative Writing major. I should have stayed dedicated to novels, poetry, and screenplays—to the joys and beauty of the artist’s life.

But I foolishly stumbled into political writing which then became activism, journalism, editing, publishing, and, of course, far too much deep research into evil people.

I foolishly embraced the delusion that so many have today: if only I could just write the right things then somehow I could impact these all-important, all-serious political elections, a project generations of Americans had spilled blood to protect.

But it didn't seem so foolish at the time, because I'd been raised in the tradition which most Americans the last 100 years+ had been: democracy is about coming together to figure out which ideas are the best and which ideas will become laws. This is supposed to be a rational process based on research and serious philosophy, discussed on PBS by highbrow people like William F. Buckley, Jr on “Firing Line” or Christopher Hitchens being interviewed by Charlie Rose.

And while I certainly knew that a lot of people voted for dumb reasons, didn't really think about the issues, or just did the "who would you rather have a beer with" test, they didn't seem that relevant.

Stupid people couldn't be the ones really at the wheel of American democracy. No, surely not. That's ridiculous. Politics is about smart, serious people having smart, serious discussions.

And so for three election cycles I maintained this seemingly believable delusion, one which many people still believe today In 2004, 2008, and 2012 I believed in and advocated for my candidate, first from the left, then the center, and finally the right.

I wrote so many articles, blog posts, advocated for one idea after another, argued against this falsehood and that, and believed that maybe, just to some degree, perhaps I was contributing to guiding others toward supporting better public policies for not just America but the whole world.

But over this and the previous two election cycles all that has now crumbled, hence the fueling of this questioning, was this all a huge mistake?

Should I have stayed in the world of Virginia Woolf and James Joyce, rather than this hellscape of Yahya Sinwar and JD Vance?

It's not that I no longer want to participate in this sacred duty of democracy, but that it does not appear that I can anymore. The campaigns are primarily trying to target voters who are apathetic, disinterested in politics, and who have no top issues.

Who out there precisely am I to target rational arguments about why one candidate is superior to the other?

Who out there who rationally looks at the candidates and the issues that matter most to them, has not already made up their mind and likely had it made up for a very long time already?

Who are these "undecided voters" out there?

Well, alas, as embarrassed as it brings me to confess this now, I am one of them.

---

I'd previously published the article above proclaiming my intent to write in Dick Cheney/John Bolton just to make myself feel better or amused to some degree.

But I must admit, now I'm not entirely sure. I have this mail-in ballot here and could certainly write their names in, drop it in the mailbox, and be done with it.

But over the last few months, to be entirely transparent, I certainly have considered breaking my "no voting for the lesser of two evils" policy that I've held steadfast since 2016.

What could Kamala Harris possibly say to convince me that she would not continue forward with the destructive Democrat foreign policy approach that has led to so much suffering since the days of FDR? Oh, is she all of a sudden going to take a much harder line on Iran than her party has embraced for decades? And such stated positions are credible and likely to become policy because…?

Having made the foolish mistake of choosing to write about war and ideological combat, having made advocating for policies to secure free societies my activist focus, I cannot in good conscience support either the pro-Iran Democratic Party or the pro-Russia Republican Party. Neither chooses to take a morally consistent stance opposing the full Axis of Genocide of Iran, Russia, and China.

These are two political parties that have had no idea what to do with themselves since the conclusion of the Cold War and have just degenerated one decade after another.

So, I'm sorry. Donald Trump may be an objectively more disgusting human being than Kamala Harris, but they're both still the leaders of two objectively disgusting political parties responsible for more failures than victories.

(Yes, by all means, please unsubscribe if you must. I understand. This Substack is an admittedly acquired taste.)

---

While I suspect very few "undecided voters" come to this spot through my weird path of knowing too much about authoritarian slave states, this general dynamic can apply to any number of subjects that people value.

Neither the Democrats nor Republicans are really putting forward substantive policy agendas or innovative strategies to address serious problems. This is just a race about whether the personality of Harris appeals to one more than the personality of Trump.

Or, more accurately in our era where negative partisanship reigns: who do you hate more?

We're back to elementary school again where the dumb popular rich kid is up against the too-smart girl with the funny name.

Only the big difference in this race is that while we all get to watch it, of the 50 kids in the class, less than 10 will actually cast a vote that gets counted.

It used to be that the electoral college was just something pondered by the political geeks. The popular vote and the electoral college seemed to always align so what’s the big deal? But no longer. Who the majority vote for isn't how we do it in this great "democracy" that generations fought and died on a battlefield to protect.

In spite of these decades of foolish political warmongering, the ironic truth is this: I've never actually voted in a competitive election. My vote has never actually mattered. First Red State Indiana then Blue State California. The actual act of voting has never escaped the level of simple entertainment akin to enjoying an episode of “Bob’s Burgers” with

Sally Shideler

and puppy Jasmine.

So, I confess to you all, dear friends and fellow patriots, what should I do tomorrow to feel best about myself? Who should I check on the ballot? Or is there some humorous pairing? At some point I should do Lebowski-Sobchak, I suppose.

Or maybe I'll just tape the unused ballot in my journal, a silent statement of disillusionment at an America that has grown dumber, meaner, and now unrecognizable as a political culture once committed to serious intellectualism has now devolved into children on a playground.

---