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Heard that before? This is a fairly common way of thinking these days, and it's an example of how far off the mark you can get when you ask the wrong question at the beginning of a decision making process. When you shoot your rifle at a target a couple of hundred meters distant, if you're a millimeter to one side of the red dot as you pull the trigger you can bet your bullet won't even touch the paper -- not a millimeter off, it could miss by several feet. Likewise, if you start with the wrong question when you're making a decision, your answer will be somewhat to the outside of poorly reasoned; it will probably be wrong and it may even qualify as bizarre or ignorant.

I used the phrase "way of thinking" above because what is involved here isn't primarily about Alan Keyes, it's about how to make a decision. You make a decision in the context of a situation. So, what's the situation? The situation is that several people are running for public office, and you have one vote to cast. Your vote will be tallied along with thousands or millions of other votes. The candidate with the most votes will win. So, the basic question, the one which sets the decision before you, is, "How should I vote?" The question which issues from the most basic question, and is really a way of focusing the basic question, is, "What principle or principles will I use to decide how to vote?"

I say that this second question -- What principles apply? -- is actually a focusing of the basic question because it's impossible to imagine making the decision without in some way applying a principle or combination of principles. Even if I put the names of all the candidates in a hat and pick one out at random, I'm applying a principle. As a guiding principle I'm accepting that this decision is one I can just as well make at random, or by using a device or method that will produce a random or chance result. My principle is that chance will produce a decent decision for me; thinking about it is unnecessary -- at least it's unnecessary to think about the election, the issues and the candidates after I've chosen this principle. Presumably I had to think a bit as I sorted through the various principles available to me, but as soon as I've decided to go with chance and discard principles like, "vote for the best man" and "vote for the man who does best in the media opinion polls,"  I need think no more about the election. I close my eyes, pull a name out of my hat and go vote.

My sense is that many people in this country, including Christians who know the Scriptures, are voting with this guiding principle or something very like it: "Vote for the best man unless the best man is not doing well in the media opinion polls, in which case, vote for someone who is doing reasonably well in the opinion polls, and who is, if not the best man, at least not the worst."

It's a very good thing that not all of us use this principle when deciding how to vote. Here's why:

1) Encouragement: People who are willing to run for public office, declaring without apology or ambivalence that it is wrong to kill innocent children, should be encouraged. Indeed, they must be encouraged, for the good of the nation. When a candidate goes to the trouble to set before the American people the truth about abortion, he should know he is not alone. You and I tell him he's not alone by voting for him, at a minimum. A check, a bumper sticker, a yard sign... there are other ways to offer this encouragement, but a vote is the minimum. We get frustrated because the few hardy souls who make a godly stand do poorly in elections. No doubt they get frustrated, too. But we can be thankful they try. They keep alive a truth the pro-aborts and collaborators of both major parties would like to suppress or avoid. Would that there were more encouragers! If there were more encouragers, those doing the grunt work on the front lines would have more success in elections.

2) Teaching: Our children should learn the truth embedded in the aphorism, "It's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game." What is so flawed about this principle that it needs radical amendment when it comes to our responsibility as citizens? Why should we  teach our children that it's not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game --  unless the way you play the game makes losing virtually a sure thing, in which case, play so you at least stand a good chance of winning?  If we teach our children to compromise essential principles, how will they fare when it comes time for them to take up the responsibilities of adulthood?  Have you ever wondered what the playing field will look like in their day and what compromises they may be tempted to make, using the same puny, utilitarian ethic?  

What if the voices calling for justice in this land continue to be on the fringes of the political struggle for a long time, representing a small minority of Americans? Do we want our children to think that justice is important, but if justice doesn't do well in the polls, then it's quite alright to support something that can pass for justice if it's not examined closely, like a Hollywood movie set that looks just fine as long as it's presented a certain way.  If that's what we teach, we shouldn't be surprised if our children end up voting for liars, scoundrels, thieves, con-men, collaborators, and even pro-aborts.

In withholding support from people like Alan Keyes -- so you can vote for a winner, of course -- are you encouraging your children to regard with scorn or indifference those who most clearly and energetically articulate what badly needs to be said in the public square in our time?  Are you teaching your children, "Do what's right, unless it puts you in a small, unpopular group that gets teased and left out, in which case, do what you need to do to be reasonably popular?" If so, then when the time comes, I'll bet my children won't vote for your children, because your children won't be qualified.

3) Hope: It's important to avoid cynicism. As a voter, deciding how to cast your ballot based on opinion polls and the seductive coaching of media zombies is just about as cynical as you can get. There's hope! Don't forget that there is hope. Do we really have have to be content with collaborators who stand in blood over their ankles and talk to us endlessly about money? We do not. Never! There's room here, I think, for a little resolve, for a little perseverance. The Lord has not forgotten the innocent. And He cares nothing for opinion polls.

4) Resistance:  There has evolved in this land a small class of people who see themselves as opinion leaders -- educators, poll takers, journalists, politicians, party hacks, government bureaucrats and an assortment of hangers on.  They aren't bright enough to form a conspiracy, as such, but they watch the same television cartoons and soap operas, they read the same comic books, and they form opinions by indulging in a kind of raucous, free-form group think, where novelty is prized for its own sake and scorn lubricates all discourse. This is the class, generally referred to as "the media," that herds Americans about like sheep... It's good for the country when every now and then a few sheep refuse to be herded. 

Around election time you can find a story every day that quotes "polls" as saying this or that about how people are thinking and how people intend to vote.  What polls? What questions were asked in these polls? And who cares anyway? Are we really making decisions by looking around to see what everyone else is doing? Do you want your children making up their minds about issues they face on the "Everybody does it" principle? You say you don't like the "Everybody does it" principle? Then ignore the polls. Dare to think for yourself.

5) Vote for the Future: An unwillingness to vote for someone who is the best candidate but has very little support is short-sighted. Let's not forget that it may take decades -- it might take the better part of this century -- to eliminate the murder of children by abortionists in the United States. The actors we are familiar with now -- Bill Clinton, Al Gore, etc. -- they can be troublesome in their own time, but they aren't the real problem. They represent and foreshadow far deeper and more serious problems in our republic. To talk like the sky will fall if a Clinton or a Gore is elected president is absurd. And yet, this is the nature of these hysterical arguments that conclude by telling us we ought to vote recklessly for whoever we have to -- even a blatant collaborator -- in order to defeat the pro-abort demon of the day. My suggestion? Calm down and get a grip.

Let's be realistic. This could be a very long struggle, and we can expect tactical setbacks. What we dare not allow is strategic undermining of our will. We can afford to lose a lot of elections as long as we don't compromise basic principles. We should not vote for or support collaborators, whatever the short term cost. 

What will someday, Lord willing, be a great flame, is now a fragile spark. It's Alan Keyes with 14 percent in Iowa and 5 percent in South Carolina, or it's the U.S. Taxpayers Party with a quarter percent in the presidential election, completely overshadowed by a pro-abort and a collaborator. But if what we want is a fire, then it's foolish not to shelter and add a speck of tinder to the spark we have. Do we slump down into a pout because great logs don't burst into flame spontaneously? Of course not. We do what we can with what we have in our time and place. If we don't compromise, if we don't disdain the spark we have, our children may have a little more to work with than we do now, and their children will have more still. There is a spark in our day. It's something to be thankful for and something to work with. Our future does not depend on a bunch of soggy slabs of cordwood. Our future is with the spark.

Vote for Alan Keyes!

Peter Barry 2/21/2000

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