All semester I have been fighting the urge to write a political column, but with the first presidential primaries only six weeks away, I can no longer stave off the compulsion to pontificate.
The primary season is a remarkably strange time in politics: Every four years presidential candidates descend upon the same few early primary states--Iowa (Jan. 3), New Hampshire (Jan. 8) and South Carolina (Republicans Jan. 19/Democrats Jan. 29)-and attempt to convince the voters of those states to vote for them in the upcoming party primaries.
Why Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina are granted the responsibility of going first and providing a springboard for the candidates to sweep all other states is beyond me. They are not terribly populous, important or representative states. History, in all of its confusion, simply pushed them to the forefront of our political system.
For those of us outside of those states, and especially for those who cannot claim residency in other early primary states like Wyoming (Jan. 5), Michigan (Jan. 15), Nevada (Jan. 19), Florida (Jan. 29) or Maine (Feb. 2), the primary season might seem terribly unimportant: we have virtually no control over our party's eventual nomination for president.
So why should we care about what is going on in the presidential race right now? As Public Policy 55D taught me, it is irrational for a citizen to spend too much time researching large elections, since the utility of each person's vote is so small.
No, there is no rational justification for any of us outside of those early states to pay attention to the presidential primaries. And yet, the primaries are impossible to escape: conversations, e-mails, magazines, television and any other medium you can think of are bombarding us with images and ideas all centered on the primaries and the fight for the nominations.
So you should care about the primaries because, like it or not, you will eventually be forced to talk about them and the candidates. And in these conversations, you will inevitably provide your point of view, despite the fact that you may not know the first thing about the presidential candidates.
Right now, if you were in one of these conversations, you would probably shoot off one of these gems of political insight: "Hillary will probably win, but I just don't like her." "Giuliani doesn't look presidential." "Can the nation elect a black man?" "What about a Mormon?" "Huckabee is funny." "McCain can't comb his own hair." "Edwards' haircut is expensive." "Ya know, I like that Thompson, he seems like he'd be fun to get a beer with."
None of these expressions, and none of the opinions you hear most often when politics comes up, has anything to do with the candidates' stances on the issues. In a general election, it is easy for most people to decide whether they want a Democrat or a Republican in the White House. There are only two real questions to answer in a general election:
What party was the last guy from?
Did I like the last guy?
Just answer those two questions and you know to whom you should give your vote. In the primary, you have to navigate between multiple people from the same party. Terrifying, I know.
So how are you supposed to differentiate candidates from the same party, if not by hairline, height or accent? Figure out where they stand on the issues! They aren't all the same: stances on Iraq, health care, education and national security vary widely between candidates even in the same party.
So take the time out of your busy Facebook-stalking, spam e-mail-forwarding, espn.com-reading Internet schedule, go to the candidates' Web sites and read up on their positions. It might not be the best use of your time by rational-choice theory, but there are a lot worse uses out there too.
Do it for yourself. Do it for democracy. Most of all, do it for me, so I don't have to hear someone quip about what a waffler that Romney is or how nice that Richardson seems, confuse Dodd and Biden or talk about how that Hillary just rubs them the wrong way. Figure out something important. It may not fix our democracy, but it can't hurt.
Jordan Everson is a Trinity senior. His column runs every Wednesday.
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