I never like to wait until the last minute to vote, because navigating through a long line of voters is no fun, although I'd do it if I had to in order to vote. Fortunately even my red state does support early voting--with voter ID required.
I voted for Barack Obama and any and all Democrats that were on the ticket. In cases where the only candidates were a Libertarian and a Republican, I voted for the Libertarian. I did vote for one Republican in a race where there were only four Republicans to choose from, no Democrats or Libertarians. He is an acquaintance of mine, and I feel that he is honest and good. Some people are Republican for reasons of pragmatism, family or friends, rather than anti-abortionism, Social Darwinism, homophobia, racism and xenophobia.
My vote for Barack Obama will not make any difference to the Electoral College result in my state, but I wanted it recorded at any rate. I believe the Electoral College is undemocratic in states where the Electors are appointed according to an "all or zero" mechanism, meaning whichever candidate gets the majority, gets all the Electors. This mechanism thwarts the will of the people. If in my state, forty-nine per cent of the people vote for Barack Obama, then forty-nine per cent of the people support him--not zero per cent as reflected by the Electoral College. My vote provides a tiny bit more evidence that this is so.
I did not vote for anybody from the Green Party because that would have truly been a wasted vote under our present system. Voting for Obama, at least there is a small chance he might actually carry the state.
I feel that Obama is more intelligent and mature and is wiser and kinder than Mitt Romney. Obama admits when he is mistaken, which is a rare quality in a politician, but reflects intellectual honesty. Obama is interested in finding the best way to achieve the optimal goal for the country as a whole and is not bound to any particular ideology, which frustrates some of his supporters. If one looks at results, the outcome of Obama's Presidency has been good for working people, as many people are now and will be covered under health insurance than were before him. (Mitt Romney will take health insurance away from people. He said so.) I counter liberal criticism of Obama with the observation that Obama is a pragmatist and can do only so much with a Republican Congress, and a Democratic Party that is middle-of-the-road, not liberal. Conservative criticism of Obama is so ridiculous that it does not deserve a moment's consideration. Birth certificate--radical negro--Islam--communism--socialism--yeah, whatever. The Republicans use lies to enlist the dim-witted into their ranks.
I have the sense that Mitt Romney is selfish and accustomed to dealing with ordinary working people with coldness and cruelty, as observed by his tenure at Bain Capital. Mitt Romney is loyal to his fellow rich and no one else. If one isn't rich, then one isn't Mitt Romney's people. I could not conceive of Mitt Romney ever for a moment considering the welfare of working people before doing whatever he calculated would bring him the most personal gain. He has never worked a day in his life, but made his fortune by preying like a vulture upon the ailing U.S. manufacturing sector, assisting in the transfer of jobs from the U.S. to China, which will cost our nation far into the future. The only curb on his speech is his calculation of the political costs, but much slips out that reveals his nature, and it is selfish, narrow and limited to self-promotion and self-enrichment and self-glorification, and much of what he says reflects his own delusions about himself and has little basis in reality. Mitt Romney does not know Mitt Romney, has never met him.
So that is why my vote is for Barack Obama.
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