Why I Am Voting for a Democratic President in 2008

I have voted Republican in every Presidential election since I was first eligible to vote – which was for Richard Nixon over George McGovern (okay, no brainer). But this year in the 2008 Presidential election, I am going to vote Democratic for the first time. For the record, I want to explain why.

In my eyes, the most important issue in any election is the role of government. I am a strong believer that less government is generally better. I hold that view particularly regarding economic policy. Government should restrict its activities to protecting the country and its citizens, and to enforcing contracts and the general rule of law. Spending on other government activities should be minimized or curtailed, and individuals should retain as much of their wealth and income to spend and invest as they see fit. All other government economic activity and spending acts as a drag on the well-being of individuals and the country generally.

In the 2008 presidential election, we have two candidates who are both liberals and who both do not understand economics or how economies work. Both candidates are likely to yield to the liberal and economic expansionist tendencies of the Congress. Prior to the previous two months, I would have predicted that either president will oversee enacting policies that will send the economy into a recession. Now that a recession is all but inevitable from the Federal Reserve’s contraction of credit, I expect that either candidate will enact policies that will only deepen and prolong the recession.

This presidential election is basically a choice between two evils. Both candidates will create a worsening of the economic situation in this country. The only choice available in this election is whether the Democrats or the Republicans are going to get blamed for the terrible economic situation in the 2012 presidential election. For me, I want the Democrats to get the blame to enable the election of a more traditional Republican candidate in 2012.

That is why I am planning to vote for the Democratic candidate in 2012. There is no way to avoid the economic damage that will be caused in the next four years. But the Democrats should properly get the blame for what is to come. The electorate will recognize their mistake and repudiate Democratic candidates and economic policies in the next election.

It is clear that either McCain or Obama will oversee the enactment of disastrous economic policies, but they will do it for different reasons and in different ways. Barack Obama is clearly a socialist in his deepest beliefs. He is more ideological and committed to equality of outcomes than he would be if he were just a populist. He believes that wealth should be distributed from the more affluent to the less well-off, and that wealth can be skimmed in this way without a problem. He does not understand how the more affluent got that way, and the multiplying effect their activiies have on the economy. He does not understand, or maybe not even care, that increasing marginal tax rates on people reduces economic activity and the growth that comes from it. Like most professional politicians, Obama does not understand that wealth is fundamentally created, not distributed. The Democratic controlled Congress is strongly oriented towards “tax and spend” policies, so they will accelerate rather than restrain Obama’s policy inclinations, as long as they get to skim a part of the redistribution for their pork barrel projects.

McCain, on the other hand, will help enact bad economic policy more from ineptitude than from ideology. He is ignorant about economics at even the most fundamental level, and so he does not understand the consequences of economic policies. Even more damning, McCain does not have any strongly held beliefs or principles about the role of government in general or economic policy in particular. At least Obama has deeply held beliefs about economic systems, fundamentally wrong though they are. In addition, McCain is a long-standing member of the Congress, where compromise is the norm. Most of McCain’s life and success has been in the Congress, where no principle is so sacred that it can not be sold out or sacrificed for a short term expediency. Consequently, McCain will be led by the Democratic Congress on economic policy, and he will compromise with them in enacting harmful economic policies – because he thinks compromising is what governing means. John McCain would be George H. W. Bush all over again, with the same depressing effect on the country’s economy, and with the same unfavorable result for the Republican presidential candidate in 2012.

The last time that the country had to choose between two Senators for president was Nixon-McGovern in 1972. In retrospect, almost everyone would agree that it was a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” choice. Since then, the country has always elected a governor to the presidency, usually over a Senator. I believe that the country inherently understands that governors know how to govern, how to make tough decisions and be responsible and accountable for their decisions. Senators, on the other hand, are seldom accountable for their actions. This year, unfortunately, we also have the unfortunate choice between two Senators, and the country will suffer for it for the next four years. All we can hope to do is to predispose a return to better economic policies in 2012.