Bleeding Heartland readers continue to make their case to undecided caucus-goers. -promoted by desmoinesdem

A few thought-provoking editorials/articles have come across my desk (figuratively) that have given me some further insight into my own reasons for supporting Hillary, into the reasons I sense a shift on the ground (however tentative) among folks I know as we approach caucus. I’ve sensed that Iowa caucusers–some–are on the move. There is a genuine uncertainty among folks who can’t decide between Bernie and Hillary, a crisis of conscience falling on the line between ideals and pragmatism.

A few events within the last week have fomented this uncertainty. First of all, the anti-establishment rhetoric from the Sanders’ campaign, which is pushing people to truly decide where they stand on “the revolution.” Second, Sarah Palin’s endorsement of Trump and the increasingly alarming fallout within the Republican Party. I’d wager that the third week of January will go down as a game changer.

Although Sarah Palin has next to zero–if not sub-zero–political credibility, her reappearance in the national political landscape has garnered a lot of attention and added even more frenzied speculation and confusion to the political conversation. Palin’s presence really transforms the metaphor of “the GOP clown car” into a literal spectacle. The cognitive dissonance generated by witnessing a former candidate for the second highest office in the land deliver a “speech” so incoherent, so rambling, so devoid of sense or meaning, has thrown us all into a sense of what-the-fuckery that we don’t even know what to do with ourselves. Even the media can’t settle on how to discuss it beyond, “OMG! She’s back!”

We’re at a turning point from amused bafflement to legitimate dismay as we witness what I would describe as the supernova implosion of the Republican party. My husband asked me the other night, “When does this top out?” And my response was, “There is no ceiling on the crazy from the right.” This isn’t a joke: our country can and probably will nominate a Presidential candidate with zero political experience or knowledge; international policy based on reality-show gimmickry; domestic policy predicated on a level of racism, xenophobia, white nationalism, and misogyny that we haven’t seen since George Wallace; too much money to be stopped; and half of the party he seeks to represent actively opposing his candidacy. Even worse: the second choice candidate is just as bad, and subject to just as much intra-party dissent.

Considering the last 20 years of right-vs-left power swings, liberals have very, very good reason to be concerned about a Republican administration, and this year that concern has blossomed into genuine–alarmed–consternation. I think we have a sense of just how bad this could be, how far we could regress as a nation.

Hillary Clinton is, for all intents and purposes, the anti-Trump. She is a grounded pragmatist, progressive on the issues that matter most to most people, a strong negotiator, and an incredibly tough fighter. She has experience beyond any other candidate in domestic and foreign policy, and she’s renowned for being the wonkiest, smartest person in the room.

In many ways, losing in 2008 was exactly what needed to happen to bring Hillary to this moment in 2016. The fact that she fought in a heated, contested primary, lost, and then came back to serve her country as Secretary makes her singularly prepared among Dem candidates to weather the shitstorm that will be the general election, and to be the strongest candidate on the field. The more of a mockery Trump makes of our political process–the more Trump’s personal wealth fuels his candidacy despite dissent among the GOP, the more his hateful rhetoric fires up a scary amount of support, the more our future as a representative democracy of, by, and for all people is threatened–the more risky a candidacy predicated on political revolution feels to me. A candidate like Hillary, with broad appeal across class, gender, racial, political, and geographical lines, feels pretty close to consensus on the left at this moment in history. Consensus or revolution?

Unfortunately, I think Bernie’s position on the role of government in American lives is too extreme at this point in time. We have right wing candidates who want to get the government “out of people’s lives,” enabling some of the worst aspects of social injustice and violence in our country, but certainly preserving the traditional conservative model that has been central to the GOP for a long time. We have a candidate on the left who wants to move towards a continental socialist government model where the government has more power to distribute wealth and services. They really couldn’t be more opposite views of the role of government in American lives. Many of us are cool with a stronger governmental role in addressing the inequality that unquestionably exists among the most marginalized Americans; yet the more real the prospect of a Trumpocracy becomes, the more people (I think) are saying to themselves, “Hey…. what we have is pretty great and we’re kind of scary-close to losing it.” The “safe” or “establishment” choice might be the strongest choice, the best choice, to ensure the we don’t lose ground, at this point in time.

Both Trump and Sanders are calling for revolution. They command mass popular appeal at huge rallies, and eschew the retail politics of typical Iowa caucusing. There is a larger-than-life aspect to both of them, in very different ways. This is exhilarating, but also feels like Icarus spiraling closer and closer to the sun for me. It feels unstable and at great risk of plummeting to the ground.

I think many people, after this past week, are seeing the value in retaining and celebrating what has been achieved in the last 8 years and making reasonable progress in areas where HRC and BS overlap in almost every way. Many do not want to upend the tables and chairs and burn this mother down. For many people, whether or not Planned Parenthood or whomever is “establishment” is far less salient than whether or not they will have rights or money or healthcare in 2017. The candidate articulating herself as the valiant, tireless protector of those things, with tenacity that (like it or loathe it) is undeniable, becomes more appealing. We–or people who share my views–don’t want to shake up the base, we want to shore it up. A revolution puts too much into play.

“These are times that trouble a man’s soul,” Thomas Paine wrote in The Crisis #1, 1776. In many ways, his words to a country standing on the threshold of existence resonate with today’s nation standing on the precipice of major political upheaval. Read on:

‘Tis surprising to see how rapidly a panic will sometimes run through a country. All nations and ages have been subject to them… Yet panics, in some cases, have their uses; they produce as much good as hurt. Their duration is always short; the mind soon grows through them, and acquires a firmer habit than before. But their peculiar advantage is, that they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered. In fact, they have the same effect on secret traitors, which an imaginary apparition would have upon a private murderer. They sift out the hidden thoughts of man, and hold them up in public to the world.

I think people are discovering something about themselves through their decision-making this year, on both sides of the ticket. Where do I truly stand, what do I stand for, and probably most pressing on the left, how do I think my values will best be advanced in government? The conversations I’ve had this month have been some of the most provocative, thoughtful, and serious of my adult life. I believe that for many of us, the candidate of pragmatism and tenacity may be much more a savior of our democracy than either candidate of radical change.