In keeping with the theme from the question for conservatives and Ross Douthat's column: time to 'fess up. Who is the candidate you supported that you're most embarrassed about now? Can be presidential or not, whatever you like.
(Except no conversion stories please in this thread; if you used to love Ronald Reagan back when you were a conservative and then you became a liberal, that's not the idea here, interesting as it is).
Sunday, November 6, 2011
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Easy. John Edwards.
ReplyDeleteActually Reagan, who I voted for as an 18 year old in 1980, turned me into a liberal. As for your question, John Edwards.
ReplyDeleteBush 2004. I really thought they could solve Iraq with a little more time.
ReplyDeleteI voted for James Earl Carter for president. Twice.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, I'm that anonymous. ;-)
Carter should have been a good president, but like Obama he was just temperamentally unsuited to the job. He had the advantage of being a lot more experienced and qualified than Obama, not that that's saying much, but he just had no comprehensive sense of scale, leadership, policy or politics, just like Obama. That spells failure.
I presume John Edwards will be a popular one - but I sense he was an unviable choice for the digressions in his personal life, not for his policies, or unusual background. In that respect, I don't really think there have been as many 'outsider' for the Democrat nomination than there are outsiders for this cycle's Republican nomination. Looking back, the field seemed much more homogeneous in that most candidates had established political backgrounds prior to their run (the most recent exception I can think of is Al Sharpton in 2004). I can't really point out any equivalent to Herman Cain.
ReplyDeleteI also don't remember candidates taking up fringe liberal positions, as Bachmann and Santorum have done on the conservative end this time round. Then again, I could be wrong; back then I was too young to notice anything like that.
I, too, would choose Jimmy Carter, although I only voted for him once. You might say he was responsible for me "throwing away my vote" for the first time at the presidential level, in 1980.
ReplyDeleteYou know, I can't think of anyone. Not Carter (for whom I did not vote--I voted for Barry Commoner in 1976 and John Anderson in 1980, neither of which embarrasses me, frankly), but even if I had, I would suggest you consider the alternatives before you're embarrassed). Not Michael Dukakis.
ReplyDeleteNot even any candidates for other offices. I even am not embarrassed by having voted for Michael Flanagan, an embarrassment even as a 1-term representative, against instead of Dan Rostenkowski, because Rostenkowski had to go and Flanagan was certainly only going to be there for one term.
I'll admit I am somewhat saved here by having left Illinois before I ever had to vote for or against Rod Blogojevich...now, that would have been embarrassing...
I can't believe I am the first out of eight commenters to bring this up but: RALPH NADER. Maybe it's a generational thing (I was a newborn during the 1980 election). For the record, I still probably agree with Nader more than I do with the Democrats, but I will always cringe a little when I am reminded of the 2000 election.
ReplyDeleteSanjit, the fringe liberal in recent cycles, i.e. the left's counterpart to Bachmann / Santorum, was Dennis Kucinich. The reason you don't remember him is that he was never taken seriously, even briefly, the way Bachmann, Cain and even Trump were this year in the GOP race.
ReplyDeleteI wish I had cast my first-ever vote in the '76 Illinois primary for Mo Udall instead of Carter. But that's minor. I would still have voted for Carter over Ford regardless, and although I was angry enough with him by '80 to vote for Barry Commoner, I don't think he's been given his due yet. His "malaise" speech, so-called, was a prescient warning that dependence on Middle Eastern oil was going to keep us tangled up in endless trouble for decades. Turns out he was right.
Edwards, likewise, is easy to dump on now, but in fact none of us really knows or is in a position to judge the ins and outs of other people's relationships and marriages (especially not people we've never even met in person), and on policy, again he was both right and prescient. He was pointing out that there are "two Americas" long before the Lesser Depression proved this and the Occupy movement rose up against the overprivileging of the 1%. Meanwhile Obama, despite doing some good things, keeps insisting on this fairy tale about how we're all in it together and bipartisan harmony will break out at any moment.
I voted for Rod Blagojevich. Twice. I suppose that qualifies as support.
ReplyDeleteI guess it's kind of embarrassing to have argued as loudly for Edwards as I did, but it's easy to content myself by looking at the way things went with health care reform. As far as I know, he was the first major Democrat to come out with that plan. When Hillary copied it during the primary, I felt like the Edwards campaign had justified its existence.
ReplyDeleteMy record only goes back to 2000. I guess Howard Dean in the 2004 Democratic primary, especially now after having seen him become an utterly unexceptional politician since then. Whereas Kerry, I think, has served admirably, even after the general election loss.
ReplyDeleteI'm not too proud of Andrew Cuomo, who got my vote in Nov. 2010 for NY governor. But since it was a general election, and I vote by party, I'm less troubled by that vote.
Jesse Jackson. I can't remember what year. It was a protest vote because I doubt he had many policy positions. I also regret not having a better choice than Kerry in 2004 more than any other failed presidential candidate.
ReplyDeleteIn a slightly different interpretation of the question, I and many other Dems made a mistake going for Obama in 2008 instead of Hillary.
Does it count as a "conversion experience" if I say Mitt Romney for governor in 2002? I wasn't a Republican then, but I was a centrist: Romney was running against a Dem I disliked and he positioned himself as a palatable choice. In retrospect, not my finest hour.
ReplyDeleteIf I absolutely must mention a (then-) Democrat I'm embarrassed by, I briefly supported Joe Lieberman in the '04 primary, for similar reasons...
Well, as a firm believer in the two-party system, your question reduces to a question about my vote in the primaries. I've voted Dem for every major office I've ever been presented with the opportunity to do so, and I don't regret a single one of those.
ReplyDeleteIn primaries, I'm still not regretful. I suppose it's fashionable to say that I regret Obama over HRC (as that's how I voted, and I'm disappointed in Obama for things under his control), but I honestly have no idea if HRC would have been any better. So, not there. I've voted for my fair share of turkeys over the years (Gray Davis, for example), but I still think I made the best choice of those available (I mean....Al Checci? Jane Harman? I'll take Davis over either of those two). I've never lived in a competitive district at the state or congressional level, so my primary vote has never caused the Dems to win or lose a general election.
I was a big Al Gore person (I even bought a bumper sticker online!) and I do regret supporting Joe Lieberman but that doesn’t really count because I voted for him because of Gore (I still think Al should have picked Dick Gephardt for VP.) That’s the closest I can come to in terms of regretting supporting someone other than obscure local politicians where I voted in terms of who would do the least damage.
ReplyDeleteI have no idea what alternate universe people come from who believe that Hillary would have magically been able to circumvent total Republican opposition in Congress (or that she and her Mark Penn-led political team would have governed more liberally than Obama).
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Onto the question, it's easier for me as I'm not quite four years into being a socialist, so I don't have to disown a vote for Blago either. I was disappointed in having to vote for Alexi Giannoulias for IL Senate in '10 - but any embarrassment is in supporting Lisa Madigan to run in the primary, she would have won the general comfortably even in a down year for Democrats.
Madigan's refusal to make the run only strengthened my fear that she's waiting around to take over the state from her daddy once she can get a crack at the Governor's mansion. (Thank goodness for "Landslide" Pat Quinn, and the Tea Party which nominated a truly scary opponent with about 20% in a 7-way GOP primary.)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Nationally, I suppose I'd have to go with supporting Anthony Weiner when it was still 'scurrilous attacks', if only because Weiner's selfishness in taking the cover-up to the bitter end gave Breitbart a scintilla of credibility.
Okay, I voted for John Anderson. I was young and repelled by the thought of reelecting Carter or voting for Reagan. In retrospect, I'd be prefer to be able to say that my biggest embarrassment was Carter.
ReplyDeleteMarion Barry, a few times, for mayor of DC. Presidential - I'd still vote the same way, every time since 1980. When I was a third grader I wore a Nixon button - that's pretty embarrasing...
ReplyDeleteH. Ross Perot. I was a senior in college and so disgusted with Bush and Clinton that I voted for Dumbo.
ReplyDeleteSince you said "supported" rather than "voted," I think I'll go with Lieberman '04. I was only 13 at the time, so I think it was just me being a good Jewish Democrat, I suppose, who knew nothing about any of the other candidates. But the way he became so apologist for Bush on Iraq, then endorsed and campaigned for McCain for president, just makes me ill.
ReplyDeleteI would have to say Arnold Schwarzenegger for governor of California, twice. I was so disgusted with Gray Davis, I supported the recall, and the Democratic opponent for his reelection, Phil Angelides (whose name I actually had to look up in Wikipedia, he was so forgettable), had absolutely no appeal even to a die-hard lib like me.
ReplyDeleteEdwards. Obviously I didn't know about the love-child thing when I advocated for him, but in retrospect, his slimy character was sufficiently evident that I should have seen what kind of politician he really was, and seen through the stated policy positions. I blame my support for John on my positive reaction to his wife :)
ReplyDeleteThat's it though, although I had a serious near-miss with Reagan. I was pretty apolitical as a teenager, and if I was 2 months older (I turned 18 at the end of December 1984), I'm sure I'd have voted for Ronnie, just because everything seemed fine and the Dem ticket left me cold (morning in America baby!). But I was just a bit too young to vote. Within 2 years, after a couple of years in college, I was feeling somewhat differently.
David Yassky, NY-11 primary 2006. Not because of anything about him but because at the time I thought I was supporting a serious legislator over a machine hack. And my old Congresswoman absolutely is a machine hack, but Yassky is, too. What embarrasses me is that I think in retrospect I probably hadn't noticed Yassky's machine-hack nature because he was white and male and from my part of the district -- that is, he was part of a machine I took for granted.
ReplyDeleteMy old Congresswoman did embarrass me, too, though I obviously don't regret voting for her. The only two times I've seen her in the news are in connection with an investigation of the financial propriety of a trip to the Caribbean, and in an article about then-Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand, also an '06 frosh, in which my MoC was asked how Gillibrand had swung getting on Ways & Means (I think) as a freshman. She replied that if she knew, then she would be on important committees, too. Yay for districting such that winning one primary (and that before anyone knows you) gives you a seat for life.
I was supporting Clinton for President in the primaries in '92. But when all the stories about his draft dodging, affairs, and pot smoking came out, I assumed he was dead and switched to Bob Kerrey. Ugh. I was also glad when Rep. John Barrow won my district who has since turned out to be one of the worst Blue Dogs. Of course redistricting has since moved me into Paul Broun's district, so I've gone from bad Congressman to worst ever.
ReplyDeleteAs a Mainer, Susan Collins and to a lesser extent Olympia Snowe. Both have solid reputations as moderates, and both have voiced support for gay rights, environmental protections, etc. But in key votes (such as the ACA), they've kept the GOP party line.
ReplyDeletewell, i voted for the socialist candidate in the 1980 election and i did feel a little silly even then. since then i've mostly been pretty boring, and i'm not going to apologize for voting for edwards in the primary---he was saying things that needed to be said. i have lived in texas the last 20 years, which means that, as a democratic, i haven't really had a chance to cast signficant votes. i did vote for the libertarian candidate for DA in 06 because i despise our local DA, but i felt creepy doing so. and i didn't vote for kinky, the candidate i'd suggest the most democrats in texas should own up to as provoking their most embarrassing vote.
ReplyDeleteAh..... big bad wolf reminds me..... I don't remember now, because it's a down-ballot race, but I may well have voted for Gil Garcetti, the DA who botched the O.J. Simpson case. (For that matter, it's possible I even voted for Judge Lance Ito, although the way judges are selected here is so byzantine that I can't say whether he would ever have been on my ballot or not.)
ReplyDeleteI've only regretted not voting. I didn't vote for President in 1968 because I didn't believe either candidate would end the Vietnam war, and my candidate had been killed. Realizing that Nixon was far and away a worse President than Humphrey could have been, I was never again tempted to a single issue choice, to not voting, or to not understanding that the election is a choice between two candidates. I've never regretted voting for McGovern in 1972, given the choice. I do not regret voting for Obama, and I will vote for him again.
ReplyDeleteBill Bradley 2000. Not because it's a bad choice, just because, what was the point? I guess I have a thing about inevitability (my biggest gripe with HRC - why embrace it?); I want some uncertainty so I feel like there's a point in paying attention.
ReplyDeleteobama.
ReplyDelete