I have realized that, with college apps, midterms, and many other things that entail a Senior year in High School, I haven’t been able to post anything on this site in months. So, I figured the best way to get back into writing here would be the start of the nomination process for President, which begins in less than a week. I am going to try and blog about the primaries, caucuses, debates, and whatever else, ridiculous or not, happens along the march to the polls. The main theme of the project will be to look at how the candidates and the nomination process itself is addressing or affecting me, a first time and young voter.
This demographic (18-29 years old) consistently has had the lowest voter turnout compared to the all other groups, per the U.S. Census graph below, but has also increased significantly over the past two decades. This all means that the youth vote has become a coveted get for politicians and much more awareness has been put on increasing their turnout in recent years, leading to more policy being geared towards them (like free public college education) or just simply politicians pretending to look cool and trendy. Along with this renewed power, young people are also the future of this country, meaning the views, opinions, and stances we express will be around much longer than our elderly counterparts. For a candidate to succeed, he/she must be able to capture the youth vote while also appeasing the older bases, a process that can be complicated given the differing perspectives and wants of the two.
Even though my vote, on the grand scale, is just another statistic making up the millions of voters, the fact that now, as an 18-year-old, I can have a say on the political process instead of just commenting or complaining about it is strange but exciting. What I want this blog to be is a weekly-ish review of the status of the election process, what my thoughts and reactions are, both as a liberal-minded person and a first-time voter, and who I would vote for President in both parties, given the “If the election was today” hypothetical.
That being said, I am going to set the stage for what has been a wild election cycle so far. For the Republicans, the race has been utterly dominated with the rise of Donald Trump of all people as the front-runner, a man whose candidacy acts like teflon; no matter how racist, rude, or downright wrong he is, his supporters couldn’t care less. His rocketing into first place in the polls has moved the entire field of the G.O.P. to the right, meaning normally radical candidates, like Ted Cruz, seem like viable options for the general election. For those in the establishment, including Chris Christie, Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, and John Kasich, the objective right now is to just weather the storm and hope that the voters regain some of their sanity or just to stand out from the pack now as the clear Trump rival, in which case all the establishment or anti-Trump votes would go to that one candidate. The others still in the race, Ben Carson, Carly Fiorina, Mike Huckabee, and Rand Paul, all will need serious miracles come February 1 to jump start their life lining campaign. While Carson still sits solidly in third in Iowa, he has fallen far from the late summer, where he briefly overtook Trump before a series of blunders and weak performance sent him tumbling down.
At this point, I just see the Republican Nomination as a huge circus so far, one filled with insults, widespread complaining, and iconic trucker hats. It continues to amaze me that Trump gets away his childish arguments and bullying campaign tactics. In a way, he represents the worst that America has to offer the world, a loud-mouthed businessman who attracts conflict and abhors compromise. I know that there is no chance that I or anyone I know will willingly vote for him, so I am still hopeful that his campaign will start to be derailed, something that might start with him refusing to participate in the next Republican debate because Megyn Kelly will be moderating. Maybe, finally, his supporters will realize how compulsive and irrational he is, qualities that I wouldn’t want in my dentist let alone in the Oval Office. I see that someone like Marco Rubio or Jeb Bush will end up winning the nomination simply because there very small chance that Cruz or Trump can win the general election because of the niche nature of their supporters and horrible ratings among independents and other key demographics like Hispanics.
On the Democratic side, things have certainly been more low key, with only three candidates on the ballot in Iowa and two, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, looking like they have an actual shot at the nomination. Unfortunately, if my primary were to occur today, I would vote for Martin O’Malley, who I feel is a great compromise between the moderate Clinton and Bernie, who is a self proclaimed “Socialist” but is polling in the low single digits behind the two frontrunners. O’Malley also has had executive experience as the governor of Maryland and accomplished many of the policies that the other two candidates can only talk about doing, a point that is somehow lost with other Democrats who either lean towards Hillary for her name recognition or Sanders for his radical and populist ideals. In the end though, I believe that Hillary should and will win the nomination, given the slim chance Martin has at this point. Like I have about Trump or Cruz in the paragraph above, Bernie Sanders’ policies appeal to a small portion of the general election electorate and are even more radical than the policies Obama can’t get through the current Congress, meaning that, even if he is elected, many of his policies will be dead on arrival and unable to become law.
And, even though I was expressed my views criticizing the disproportionate role that the early primaries play on the election process, I am still very excited for the primaries to start and experience my first election cycle that I can actually have a say in and look forward to paying close attention to all the latest developments and posting my views on them here.
Nathan Bindseil
Trespassing Allowed 