Hard hard did she work for Shirly Chisholm in ’72

I am conflicted.

While I would love to see a female voice in the POTUS seat, because women are humans and despite being on equal footing in a theoretical world, I do think that the experience of female is inherently different in this world, modern and less so. This is not to say that a woman should be given a position simply by virtue of being the first uterus to stand in line, however it should similarly not discount her from being elected. I think at times that I stand most closely with the Ginsberg model of building an inescapable net in which the logic of discrimination is forever caught up. In order to assure women’s rights, you must first remove women’s privilege. A scary thought, as those few battles were deserved for many reasons, and as unfair as those barriers which for no reason were erected, defended and warred over. It is without a net that we dance on high lines in this fight for equality. And without a few deaths, the precious arrival at the other side might not taste so sweet. Is that just the mantra we tell ourselves, or is there a deep truth in chance and luck. Is there a reason that we toe the edge of something, is it to feel the wind in our faces, or it is a deeper need to understand boundary and safety as it relates to the current moment in which we live, and perhaps die.

I am conflicted.

One candidate leans so far to the left that he is swimming in the socialist kiddie pool.

One candidate is floating in a sea of hair spray and egomania.

One candidate is really more of a classic republican than anything else – and this is my conflict. Because, I like a lot of those ideals. The ideals that allowed Lincoln to be the president that freed the salves without being a complete radical. He played the rules and won the long game, even if perhaps he didn’t mean to. These are the tenents that to me, this country is built upon; that if you pay attention, put in work, and get a little lucky, there is a lot on the other side. Like all things though, success depends on luck. The luck of the draw, and the luck of the hand holding the cards, but also the luck of context, the luck of outside environment, the luck of others, and the failure of luck.

I digress.

I am conflicted, because I feel like this thing that is a lot of the things I look for, this thing, is not the thing that should be. This thing believes in children as super predators, this thing believes that personal email servers are just bad judgment, and not national security issues, this thing is potentially another decade of the same policies that while reviving the economy, destroyed the culture. What are the goals, do we teach the next generation, or fix the current one. Do we heal the bodies or the minds. Do we fight a war here or abroad. The choices are not that different, but the results may not be that far apart either.

What is the best option when one of the choices looks interesting, but ineffective. Alone, in a vacuum, sure. But when faced against the current speaker, when thrown into the war mongering circles of hell that live below the capitol building, when any of the context is taken in the same mouthful, I have to wonder at the potential.

The other side of the coin, is something that looks like it definitely is effective – but at what cost? Are we going to say fuck it, and pick the truck that we know was a lemon at one point, based on the salesman assuring us that the flaw has been removed.

I am conflicted.