I haven’t voted in an election, local, state or national since the year 1992. I voted for Clinton. I felt it was important at the time to do so as I was convinced the GOP was working on destroying the things I felt were important to not only save, but bolster…but then Clinton went and did all the destroying: bombing Iraq, depleting the social safety net, the Telecommunications Act of 1996…just a few of his greatest hits.

Also back during this time, I’d begun reading Anarchist philosophy. The interest came primarily from the music I was listening to and soon I was reading Emma Goldman, William Godwin, Peter Kropotkin, Alexander Berkman…and as I continued to read, I also continued to watch Clinton move the political discourse towards the middle so that the centrist Democrats soon began taking the positions of Republicans…the philosophies I’d been reading became all the more important and reasonable, discourses on mutual aid, equality and toleration, a rejection of materialism and greed, the questioning of mass consumption at the expense of everybody, etc…

My friends back in the day, they looked askance at the books that soon populated my apartment…well, they kind of looked at any book that way but especially those books and despite my trying to explain that anarchism wasn’t a bunch of bomb throwing nihilists…(and really, bomb throwing nihilists would be a polite way of discussing people like Cantor, Vitter, McConnell, Walker and Boehner these days) my friends weren’t buying it. Besides, they all wanted to be at the bars anyway and whereas I used to be a part of that scene, I had been quickly losing interest, so instead I hooked up with the Autonomous Zone in Chicago and soon partook in the protests around the 96 Democratic Convention, also in Chicago. There I marched with thousands, lit bonfires in the streets, faced off against the CPD with their billy clubs and felt my new philosophies becoming more and more ingrained.

And I never voted again.

Why vote, participate in a system that had very little to do with any people I knew, or with reality, or with poverty? Voting to me was kind of like an atheist going to church, a fairly empty exercise so I preferred to let my discussions, my work, any and all volunteer activity be my political participation. It felt back then, and feels now today, more honest and sincere. Nobody likes to feel like a hypocrite.

Okay, so I did volunteer for three days with the Green Party during a brief stint in Seattle shortly after the WTO protests, but then I discovered what a crook Nader was so I quickly backed away from all that.

Anyways, anarchism still makes the most sense to me…I’ve heard all the discussions and arguments, but whether those around me find my beliefs to be feasable or not, it feels good to live according to them the best I can rather than trying to make them fit into a box they cannot, like when I considered voting for Kerry…or like these past couple of years watching one more failed Democrat like Barack Obama turn out to be only one more self-proclaimed hope and change artist who does no more than offer up the social safety net one piece at a time to appease a congressional minority, rather than just deep-sixing the whole thing like the GOP would prefer, and then calling this a decision he made according to his values. I suppose it makes sense, as its easier to betray your proclaimed consituency one bit at a time as opposed to wholesale, all at once. 

The man has no spine.

None, none whatsoever.

And because of this…I’m preparing to vote for the first time in twenty years, and it certainly won’t be for Obama. No thanks, I don’t feel things will really change until people get really uncomfortable and I think we can all agree that as the discussion continually moves right, then right some more, then the bankers get off for causing the recession, for fraudulently foreclosing on homes, for reaping enormous profit on the destruction of the middle class, and then the discussion moves right once again.

With the debt limit talks, the GOP says no new taxes, all cuts. The Democrats say lots of cuts and a couple of new taxes? Please? Pretty please?

Here’s what Obama, during his press conference, should have said, but of course did not. He really didn’t say much of anything, except to duck and dodge and appear to try and keep the doors open for more Democratic appeasement.

Had enough of all that.

So, now it would appear if I really want things to change, I’ll be forced to hold my nose and vote for the first time in twenty years.

Vote for Michelle Bachman. Goddamn right.

I think the time has come to really do something radical…to drive this country into the ground as quickly as possible. Essentially, kill it off in one fell swoop, rather than this slow death of failed appeasement that appears to be the Democrat’s way.

So bring in Michelle.

At least then, once its all over, the real work can begin. Then maybe we can all get together and have a conversation, plot the destruction of those who’ve become so consumed by the gathering of wealth, they decided that all of you, all of us were expendable in the process. So yeah, I’m voting. After all, President Bachman has an interesting, horrific doomsday ring to it.

The way I see it, the coast of Louisiana and the rest of this country doesn’t have any more time for the slow end. Time to start over. So who better to bring it to the brink then Bachman…in fact, that should be her campaign slogan: “Bring it to the brink! Vote Bachman!”

Or not.

Okay…maybe not.

I don’t know if I can actually go through with it: voting for her or voting in general, but hey, it’s a thought…

Have a nice day.

PS…if interested in anarchist goings ons in the NOLA area, please check out Nola Anarcha…