So what is the alternative to holding my nose and voting Hillary? [View all]

[KPN]

Two years ago I attended a debate among candidates for my District's Congressional seat. A Republican, a pretty progressive Democrat, and a Green Party candidate. I was so impressed with the Green Party candidate that I approached him to ask him why he wasn't trying to work and run within the Democratic Party. He was about my age. He looked at me for a second (I suppose now that he was framing his response as opposed to offending me by saying something like "are you naive?&quot and said because the Party would never support him as a candidate for Congress. He then proceeded to explain how he'd been active as a precinct member for many years before finally realizing that the Party was moving right not left and was never going to change as long as money drove the system. He basically said what Bernie says: the system is corrupt -- and to be successful within the Party system, you have to be a "team player" and "play ball". He said it was obvious to him that the Democratic Party was in bed with corporations and money, controlled by what he called Republican lights, and was no longer committed to truly progressive principles. So he left and joined the Green Party.

This primary season has, as I said, been a real eye opener. The Party is clearly corrupt as is our government. They have been purchased and are controlled by "money". Bernie's campaign has done a wonderful job at making this abundantly clear to anyone who has been paying attention.

So you asked, what is the alternative? I ask: do you truly care about your country? I am convinced that holding my nose and voting simply enables the status quo. What is the status quo? Well, it's really not very good. Sure, we make progress on social issues, to a degree, but we continue to trend to the right on economic and electoral issues. The Democratic Party simply is not committed to making the kind of fundamental changes that we so desperately need today. "Slowing" the flow to the right is not fixing the problem; and I'm frankly not convinced that Hillary would even slow the flow to the right when it comes to key economic issues. (I won't even bring up the problems of imperialism here.)

The alternative for me is to support real change. I will either be voting for Jill Stein (Green Party) after doing some more research, or writing Bernie in this fall.

Am I concerned about Trump? Yes, but my adult children have given me broader perspective on that and the SCOTUS issue. Actually, they have convinced me by example that voting for Hillary is the wrong thing to do. You see, one of them, my second child is gay. Another, my daughter, the youngest is a female. They are quite adamant that "equal rights" will be meaningless in 20 years if we don't break down the corporate hold on America's governance to actually fix our most important problems now today: global warming, a divided world, and income inequality. So social issues that affect them personally in significant way are moot as they see it if we don't make the significant changes today. My third child, the oldest, is a bit more radical. He just says we gotta break the system to fix it; a Trump presidency would do that.

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I understand that some here will take exception to and tell me how short sighted and self-absorbed this is. But I see it as exactly the opposite. So please respect my views and opinions and I will respect yours.