My second presidential election as a voter is looking identical to the first, and I could not be more disappointed with both parties.
The New Hampshire primaries took place last week. Donald Trump was the reigning Republican, despite two impeachments and two indictments. Joe Biden took over 60% of the democratic votes despite not being on the ballot.
As of Saturday, Jan. 27, Republican runner-up Nikki Haley seems to think that the race for the nomination is far from over. However, after her two losses in double-digit margins, it is only a matter of time until Trump is the only remaining conservative in the running.
New Hampshire Democrats led a write-in campaign for Biden that resulted in nearly 80,000 votes. Writing in an 81-year-old incumbent with such force is a perfect snapshot of the Democratic Party and its genuine inability to make any meaningful change.
This year’s political environment certainly feels different than it did four years ago. COVID-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement instilled a real sense of urgency during the last election cycle, especially for young people. We may not see these two hot-button issues in headlines anymore, but there was no satisfying resolution to either.
Systemic racism still exists. Millions of Americans refused the COVID-19 vaccine. Trump and Biden will soon grace our ballots once again.
To me, this rematch reinforces a lot of cynicism I feel towards national politics. They just don’t go anywhere. It is broadly disappointing to feel like I am inheriting a system that only spins in place, which is in turn personally discouraging when I think about the change I can make on my own.
If it were not so painful it might be poetic. The 2020 election saw the highest percentage of eligible voters at the polls in 120 years. The Trump presidency and its fallout were ruinous. Millions still believe he won in 2020 and should again in 2024.
All the while, the best thing the Democratic Party can put in the White House is an octogenarian who continues to increase defense spending and failed to protect abortion on a national scale.
If we don’t have any real comfort or individual power in the capital, where do we? As trite as it sounds, politics really begins with the people around us. While reading Matt Taibbi’s 2008 book “The Great Derangement,” I was struck by one concept. We see ourselves in demographics rather than communities.
Following the donkey and elephant circus of national politics too closely will either bore or exhaust a perfectly capable human being into submission. It will convince us to vilify the people next to us instead of working with them, the only way anything works at all.
The message of this is not that we should all ignore what politicians do during an election year. Far from it. Voting in the big elections and staying informed is the least we can do, not the most.