Missive the Thirty-Second

To Spit in the Eye
Of Electoral Indifference.

DATELINE: Friday, November 3, 2000, at 2300 hours CDT.
Conway, Arkansas, USA

By D. Ebenezer Baldwin Bowles
CornDancer & Company

Tuesday's U.S. Presidential Election will be the ninth of my voting life. I've cast a ballot in each of the previous eight. Lord willing and the creek don't rise -- and because I must spit in the eye of my indifference for the sake of democracy -- I'll very likely continue the habit next week.

1968:

Richard M. Nixon, Republican
Hubert H. Humphrey, Democrat
George C. Wallace, American Independent

My virgin vote was given to Mr. Nixon. He seemed like he would make the best Commander-in-Chief. As a young officer candidate at Benning School for Boys (the U.S. Army training center for infantry platoon leaders), I was intensely interested in the military role of the President. Standing sharply at parade rest in Infantry Hall, I fell in line with the older hawks of Ninety-Sixth Company and cast my ballot for the veteran cold warrior.

Victory. Record: 1-0.

1972:

Out of uniform, enrolled in University, and radicalized by reverberations from my recent participation in the Viet Nam war, I turned away from the hot warrior Mr. Nixon and embraced Mr. McGovern. The campaign of the arch liberal from the Dakotas was fun to watch. The choice was sharply drawn. I took some solace in the folly of my budding liberalism and voted for the doomed candidacy of the most far-out mainstreamer of my time.

Loss. Record: 1-1.

1976:

Mr. Carter came across as fresh and vibrant, the consummate outsider. Senator McCarthy had shouted too loudly when he called me a baby killer. Mr. Ford, the unassuming incumbent, was simply too much the klutz, too much tainted by his pardon of President Nixon. I voted (with some intellectual passion behind it) for Mr. Carter.

Victory. Record: 2-1.

1980:

Mr. Carter's failure to liberate the hostages, who had been seized from the embassy at Tehran and transformed mercilessly into propaganda puppets, was galling enough, but his disastrous rescue mission (the crashed choppers in the desert, the death and fiery destruction of it all) tipped the scales against the Commander-in-Chief. The President's earnest decency and his passion for peace roused my political sympathies. His opponent's westerly politics seemed strange and distant. This was the toughest of choices. I wavered 'tween the incumbent and Mr. Reagan 'till the bitter end, but my gall over the hostages, Iran's arrogance, and America's impotence overcame my best intentions. Toward Mr. Reagan I cast my first protest vote.

Victory. Record: 3-1.

1984:

This time 'round, I had thoroughly bought into the act of the retired movie star. President Reagan's bravado under the fire of an assassin's bullet, his confidence on a turbulent world stage, and his witty asides and soothing speeches were downright masterful. Mr. Mondale, a lightweight from the far north, hardly made a wave. My vote for the incumbent was cast with nary a second thought.

Victory. Record: 4-1.

1988:

This one marked the beginning of my slide into cynicism about the office and the men who seek it. The Democrat was a strange duck, a passionless Yankee with an odd turn of phrase and a mysterious, ephemeral spouse. I recall being impressed, for some indistinct reason, by Mr. Bush's service as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Perhaps I thought he could deal better with the Soviets. Maybe it was because I had recently opened a business and thought the Republicans would better serve my interests. Stripped of political zeal, I voted for the Vice-President.

Victory. Record: 5-1.

1992:

Mr. Clinton was outta the picture from the get-go. His duplicity during the war years never sat well with me. His plans for government were just too darned vaporous, slippery, and opportunistic. The President, goofy and aloof, appeared to me as an empty suit; his victory over a third-rate Arab army in the Gulf sands never once impressed me. I wanted Mr. Perot to ride into the Capitol with a broom and sweep the establishment into oblivion. I voted for his idea of radical change, knowing it was another pipedream from an insanely wealthy egoist.

Loss. Record: 5-2.

1996:

The amusing, sometimes provocative radical of '92 had become the strident crank of '96; I would not repeat my vote for Mr. Perot. By default and in respectful homage to the veterans of World War II, I cast my ballot for Mr. Dole, but only barely. In a fit of renewed cynicism, I decided to boycott the polls, but changed my mind on election morn after a chat with a dear friend, who refused to accept my sacrilege and shamed me into changing my mind. I wanted to vote Communist, but couldn't find one on the ballot. Mr. Dole was an acceptable second.

Loss. Record: 5-3.

2000:

Tuesday's election is special, not so much because of a renewed passion for electoral democracy as practiced in USA, but because my No. 1 son will cast his first ballot for President of the United States of America. It's his nineteenth birthday. I've no idea which candidate he will choose. If I knew, I wouldn't tell. A vote is a secret to be revealed only by the holder of it. As for me, I'm going Green!

Loss. Record: 5-4.

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My Record Will FallTo Five Wins, Four Losses.