Why I haven't declared for a Presidential Candidate

No Triangulation Zone

I love Bernie's plank. I love his effort on behalf of himself. I love Hillary. I love Hillary's effort on behalf of herself. I loathe our current primary process. I loathe that we don't have a movement pushing candidates across the board and that we still have folks who think we can dump both the Democratic party and the Republican party for a third party without ruinous consequences. I loathe that from my local party on to the top of the ticket, candidates can't afford to run for office unless they (or their volunteers) spend all their time raising money. It's nothing personal, it's just the corrupt habits of our country. What we are used to. We are like pigs who live in a stye. We got used to the smell. That's all.

There are Alternatives

In this day of electronic voting, Facebook, Ebay, social media, youtube, etc... we still depend on unpaid volunteers to do work that would be full time employment for paid employees. And we wind up with ambitious folks exploiting labor, creating astroturfed organizations that are well funded, while worthwhile causes go under or go wanting because they are underfunded. The Republicans understand the value of money in politics. Many of their "volunteers" draw funds from private organizations dedicated to republican causes like prohibition of abortion, power to corporations, or simply electing Con Artists. Meanwhile the Democrats can pretty much rely on the Cons to make up a scandal to undermine our institutions and they typically depend on charity for their survival which exposes them to the power of improper access and undue influence.

"Would you like to Swing on a Star ... we can be better than we are.

I'm not bitching. I'm ready to do what I can to change this. First the party apparatus needs to be as open as party membership. Anyone should be able to start a party sub-chapter where there presently isn't one or a party faction where they don't like the current one. And we need to setup the communications infrastructure, voting infrastructure and formal electioneering structure to make it work and allow others to participate.

Think (and Strategize) Global, Act local

So in the meantime I'm going to focus on finding ways to help progressives in my corner of my State of Maryland and the State of Maryland, to find good people to run for office, cultivate progressive policies among our current politicians, and defeat the con artists in the GOP -- and the Con artists in the Democratic party while I'm at it. And if either Hillary or Bernie want my support they are going to have to help us in that effort to build a platform and hold political candidates to executing that platform.

The politicians who are serious about doing that -- get my vote.

The days when politics was like boxing with candidates looking out only for themselves are over.

This is the No Triangulation Zone.

 

Christopher H. Holte