Dear Democratic Superdelegates,
I am a registered democrat, and I wanted to take this moment to explain why I will be choosing Donald Trump over Hilary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election. And before you write me off as being bitter, or misinformed, let me say this: I know that Trump will destroy this home we've built together. I want you to understand why, for millions of disenfranchised voters like me, that very destruction is the best hope we have.
A little background: after four years at the university where I earned my bachelors degree, created and served as the president of two clubs, and became heavily involved in negotiating with administrators and contractors on behalf of the student body; after all of that, I got a contract with one of the largest tech giants in our country. (There's a good chance you're using one of their products right now.) I did technical writing and managed accounts for clients that spent over a quarter of a million dollars per month with our company. Three years later, my contract was shipped overseas and I found myself without a job.
During the time I spent at that company, I was making good progress toward paying off my student loans. In fact, I had managed to pay off all of the private loans my university had pressured me into taking. And at this point 2016, had my job not been outsourced, I'd have the majority of my federal loans paid off as well. Instead, chronic underemployment and my inability to pay even the monthly interest on my loans has caused the amount I owe on those loans to almost double.
I started my college education just as the effects of the housing bubble were starting to be felt across the nation. Only in hindsight have I realized that I could have purchased a home with the same amount that I spent on my education. That's a very painful realization to have. Luckily, my younger brothers learned a lesson from my pursuit of the American Dream. One went into the military and is now a police officer. The other learned a trade. Both of them are better off than I am because they did not put off their careers in the vain attempt to better them.
I still believed in the American Dream, though, after I lost my job. I had paid off my private loans and squirreled away some extra money so that I would be prepared in the event that I did lose my job. Which I obviously did.
With the job market what it was, and still is, I decided that entrepreneurship was my best shot to earn the kind of income that would allow me to pay off my student loans. I used the money I had saved up to support myself and set up a little website, and within a few short months my website was receiving 50,000 hits a month. “This is great,” I thought. But my savings were dwindling and it became apparent that I didn't have the time, money, or resources to create a product or service that could turn all of that potential into real income.
Now I'm working at the local supermarket alongside some of the same people I went to university with, or with young kids who are attending my alma mater. There are some days that I want to scream at them to get out, that they're walking into a trap, but I don't. I'm wise enough to know that they would only become indignant with me; they believe they are the exception to the rule.
A lot of people I went to university with ended up in the same boat I'm in. Others went to trade school because their bachelors degrees were worthless. Some did end up going to graduate school, and while their CV might be more impressive, I still hear every single one of them complain about not being able to find work in their field because of the competition, or about being miserable with the work they are able to find. Of the few people I went to school with who could be considered successful according to the tenets of the American Dream, those are the people who are suffering most from ill-health due to the long hours and tedious work required to maintain their standard of living. They're overweight, they have high blood pressure, they have heart conditions, they have insomnia. Working hard is supposed to improve your life, not trade one set of misfortunes for another. Or so the story goes.
My peers and I have had to start having a rigorous discussion about at which point we'll simply have to kill ourselves. This isn't the somber questioning of a depressed few. This is the practical solution to a systemic problem that cannot be solved by any one individual. Certainly, if we suffer any major medical problems, we will be forced to kill ourselves. Because if we have to choose between paying medical bills or buying food, there's clearly no choice. If rent continues to skyrocket, if food prices continue to skyrocket, if work continues to be scarce; these are all factors in how long we can justify living. Because at a certain point, the cost of living simply isn't possible to pay.
So let's stop here and be honest with ourselves. Donald Trump cannot destroy this country. This country has already been destroyed. The only question we have to ask is whether we want to let those embers smolder and put off rebuilding, or do we want to throw gasoline on the fire, burn everything to ash, and finally be left with solid ground to build a great country on top of. That's what a Donald Trump vote means to voters like me if we are only given the choice between Clinton and Trump.
My generation has realized that the system we are living in can offer us no guarantees of a comfortable life, no matter how hard we work. That's why my fellow graduates are learning trades, and why people all across the spectrum are learning to garden, and preserve food, and develop the skills they need to make things with their own hands. We're learning to do things without the system that's been holding us back. We have no delusions about how hard life is without our modern conveniences; we just realize that life is hard with our modern conveniences, and we get very little for it.
You want to create the belief that we are different, but I can tell you the quintessential difference between Democrats and Republicans. We squabble about little things, but the big difference is that we Democrats are optimists, optimists who believe that a government can serve as a force which protects those people who cannot protect themselves, and a force which creates a fair system in which those who were not born into money still have a chance to be successful. We believe it because we've seen other countries create those kinds of governments. Republicans, on the other hand, are pessimistic. Or perhaps just pragmatic. They look at our country, they see that the majority of people haven't benefited from the fairness and equality that the system is supposed to provide, and they've just been hurt too much to have any faith in that system. And I feel their pain. They would rather arm themselves and go off to fend for themselves without any bullshit rules holding them back. And I cannot blame them.
Given the increasingly visible incompetence, or downright corruption, occurring in the election process over the last few election cycles, I'm of the mind to agree with them. We cannot get to where we want to be from where we are now.
Like any good liberal, I believe in reusing and recycling. This election cycle I had hope. I saw a candidate who took one look at the burning house that America built and said “You know what, this house is on fire, but we have smart people here. We can put out that fire. And once we put out that fire, there's plenty of good timber still yet left in that house. There are good windows, good pipes, and a solid foundation. Not everything is good. Not everything can or should be saved. But we'll save what we can and rebuild this country.” That candidate was—and if you are wise, still is—Bernie Sanders.
Do not suppose that if a Democratic constituent chooses to vote for Trump, that it is purely an act of protest. The truth is that, while we might hate his bigotry and complete lack of experience, he is going to get us a lot closer to what Bernie has been promising than Hilary will, even if the process that takes us there will be a lot uglier. Trump will pour gasoline on our country and watch it burn to ashes, Sanders will put out the flames and salvage what he can so we can start rebuilding, and Hilary will roast marshmallows while America burns. If the only options I'm given are to watch the country burn slowly, or to watch it burn quickly, I'd rather just get it over with.
In just a few short weeks, you'll be deciding which candidate will represent our party in the general election. It's already clear that most of you will side with Hilary Clinton, and that is your prerogative. But if your sole motivation is to get a Democrat in the White House, I urge you to reconsider. You've mistakenly believed that, for the average American voter, it is a question of Democrat versus Republican. It is not. It is a question of whether we'll save anything of the system we have now, or burn it all to the ground.
I will not make smores.
