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From the Kitchen Table

Predictions

by Peg Luksik

One of the most amazing parts of this Presidential election is the myriad of voices telling voters not just which candidate they should vote for, but what is, or is not, an acceptable reason to vote for that candidate.

Candidates have always been expected to give reasons for getting a vote. Those reasons range from, "I'm the best," to "I'm different than the status quo," to "Anybody is better than the other guy and I'm anybody." Some candidates run positive campaigns, "Vote for me because...". Some run negative ones, "Vote against my opponent because...". And some run a combination of the two, hoping to attract voters who agree with them, and capture those who dislike their opponent.

But today we have a new, and disturbing, voice in American politics. Today we have the political expert. The person who does not enter the fray himself, but attempts to direct the outcome. The expert may be a member of the media, or an academic who is consulted to offer input.

When evaluating the input of an expert, it is necessary to remember that each is also a voter who has his own preferred candidate. Each also needs his predictions in every election cycle to be correct to continue being considered an expert by his peers. So no expert is impartial in his judgment or his actions.

Some experts control the flow of information. For example, name recognition is important for any candidate in any election. A media expert can support, or undermine, a candidate simply by controlling how many times he mentions the candidate's name in his reporting of the election process. One tracking company reported that in a one year period, one candidate's name was mentioned about 4,000 times, while another candidate, for the same office and in the same party, was mentioned 95,000 times in the same media markets. The monetary value of that discrepancy would be calculated in the millions, all unnoticed and unreported.

Some experts use the "bookie approach". These experts predict the winners and then tell voters that unless they vote for one of the candidates selected by the experts as "electable", the vote is wasted, even if the voter disagrees with the character or philosophy or positions of that candidate. When a voter asks how it is meaningful to cast a vote for a candidate who is pledging to move in a direction opposite to the wishes of that voter, he is told that he is being too idealistic or narrow-minded.

Voters need to remember that in the end, they are in charge. When they walk into the ballot box, they can cast their vote for whatever candidate and for whatever reason they choose.

It's like the Super Bowl. Every expert said that New England was unbeatable. In the pre-game media reports, the events on the actual football field were treated as little more than a formality leading up to the coronation of the Patriots.

And then the actual game happened.

Somewhere along the line, the Giants didn't get the memo. They treated the action on the gridiron like a real game. They didn't believe the experts who told them they "couldn't win".

And because they trusted their own hearts and followed their own convictions, they proved the experts wrong.

Elections are the actual game in political races. And every voter has the chance to trust his own heart and follow his own convictions in the ballot box. In the end, experts don't control elections, voters do – if they remember that they can.