Eight Feet Deep

My daddy used to say that if a per­son didn’t vote then that per­son didn’t have a right to com­plain about how things turn out in our gov­ern­ment. Of course, as Pop well knew, I could com­plain regard­less of whether I voted. But I got his drift.

I thought about this while head­ing to vote this morn­ing at Cen­tral Med­ical Mag­net School in Beau­mont. For prob­a­bly the first time I can remem­ber in an elec­tion, I faced a real dilemma although some might call it “choice.” That choice was whether to vote in the Repub­li­can or Demo­c­ra­tic primary.

The deci­sion of in which pri­mary to vote was as sim­ple as a kindly vot­ing clerk lady say­ing “Demo­c­rat or Repub­li­can” when I walked into the boys’ gym­na­sium where vot­ing was held. It’s funny, that smell of sweat from ado­les­cent boys seems to never fade.

My dilemma stemmed from one race, which was the Repub­li­can pri­mary for Texas gov­er­nor that pits estab­lished U.S. Sen. Kay Bai­ley Hutchi­son and Tea Partier Debra Med­ina against incum­bent Gov. Rick “And His Hair Was Per­fect” Perry.

Now as reg­u­lar read­ers know, I have no desire to see any of those three — or any three that I can think of — Repub­li­cans elected Texas gov­er­nor. But like other Democ­rats in the state who really DON’T want Rick “Secede from the Union” Perry reelected, I con­sid­ered briefly vot­ing for Hutchi­son who is run­ning uncom­fort­ably behind Perry. A Demo­c­ra­tic vote for Hutchi­son, accord­ing to pun­dits like Texas Monthly’s Paul Burka, might — might — force Perry into a runoff. There the gov­er­nor could be embar­rassed and his cam­paign weak­ened. It cer­tainly would mean spend­ing more money, what with another elec­tion. All of this could con­ceiv­ably help the Demo­c­ra­tic can­di­date, likely for­mer Hous­ton mayor Bill White, beat Perry in November.

In the end though, I could not do as one of my favorite blog­gers, Eileen Smith of In the Pink: Texas Monthly, said she ulti­mately did which is vote on the Repub­li­can ballot.

When the nice lady said: “Demo­c­rat or Repub­li­can” this morn­ing I headed straight for the Democ­rats. Old habits are dif­fi­cult to quit, like smok­ing and watch­ing porn. I have always voted the Demo­c­ra­tic bal­lot. The first time was to vote for Jimmy Carter and, yes I am proud to say I did vote for him. No one said our pres­i­dents can’t have their faults. (See George W. Bush)

Four more years of Rick Perry is not a prospect I care to think of on a nice pre-spring day on which I heard about three or four great songs in a row on the radio. But I have pretty much been a Demo­c­rat all my life and there are just some things I won’t do, like wear a Snug­gie, sing “Feel­ings” in a karaoke bar and vote in a Repub­li­can pri­mary. It was a dif­fi­cult choice to make but it was pretty sim­ple there in the end.