October 15

 Sunny today but we expect pulses of lake effect rain today. We had almost constant rain. I hope things out in the gardens will dry out enough to get some more clean up done. It turned quite cool last night--enough that I turned on the heat. But the weather forecasts call for a rollercoaster of temperatures for the next week or two. 

Bill Astore covers a controversy I have seen revisited often over the last thirty or forty years: whether it is better to vote for the better of two "evils" or to "waste" your vote on a third party candidate whose proposals better align with your values. I debated this very question often over that time. I didn't really want to vote for Clinton but Trump, even in 2016, was totally unacceptable. I didn't really want to not for Biden but all the other candidates I preferred fell by the wayside and Trump was even more unacceptable in 2020. The last four years have only solidified my assessment of Trump. In fact everything he has said and done has intensified my disgust. Considering how the party "leaders" in positions of power have rallied around him I will not vote for almost any Republican candidate at any level. I have said before that the only one who has done anything to earn my vote is the Republican Mayor of our town who is running for reelection. The candidate for Governor was our Senator who voted to "acquit" Trump at his impeachment trial which makes him unacceptable. The Representatives voted against the impeachment and are similarly unacceptable. What I do  know now is we have a choice between a Democrat whose policies probably diverge from what I think are needed or a "putative" Republican who respects no boundaries, no laws, no traditions. And he has people around him who will facilitate his policy or push what ever of his buttons that will lead him to enact their policies--policies I find offensive. I don't think in terms of "wasting" my vote. I think in terms of who has a chance of being elected and will follow customs and laws--or one who also has a real chance of being elected and won't. I like voting (even if my choices are rarely successful), I like living in a country where laws are usually supreme (not psychopaths), being able to criticize without wondering if someone with power will sic the Justice Department or the IRS on me. I simply hope enough of my fellow citizens agree--that is what democracy is all about. And we will have it, as Benjamin Franklin may have said, as long as we can keep it which means as long as we value our democracy to elect people who won't destroy it. If both of the candidates would support our Constitutional order and abide by our laws we can indulge in supporting third party candidates who are more philosophically palatable.