CLAMDORSEMENT 2020: The Elections

Greetings Clam-Desperados: 

It’s another episode of what-the-fuck-is-this-political-hell-hole-we-are-living-in and how can we get through this season so we can move on to a nice triumph-of-the-human-spirit -produced-for-Netflix-special where we don’t have to worry about the POTENTIAL FOR IMMINENT COLLAPSE OF DEMOCRACY every waking fucking moment.

Enquiring minds are tired of everything political and wondering who we here at the Clam are endorsing and if we could do a very short Clamsplainer ™ on all things ballot related. YES. Yes we can.  The whole team worked on this one, so give them their props.

 

THE VERY SHORT BALLOT QUESTION TL;DR:

Are there Ballot Questions? YES 

Will you have to turn over your ballot to see them all? YES

Should you vote on them? YES 

What should you vote? YES

What about the last two non-binding questions that I didn’t even know existed? YES on those also.

Should I really vote “Yes” on all the ballot questions? YES

 

THE “WHO SHOULD I VOTE FOR” TL;DR:

We think, correction, we know, if you want a democracy so you can actually vote in the future, you should roll up any doubt, toss it into the dumpster fire that has been 2020 and cast your votes for:

Joe Biden & Kamala Harris. 

Ed Markey. 

Seth Moulton. 

Really. 

“Wait, what? Shouldn’t I stand up for my beliefs? Aren’t you guys left leaning liberal progressives?”  “Shouldn’t we be writing in…”

Dude, you asked for the short version. Read on if you still need guidance on which candidates to write-in.

(LONG VERSION FOLLOWS)

As you readers of the Clam know well, we’re not exactly “conservative” here. Unless we are talking about the environment and in that case we are decidedly conservationist ;), but even then we like wind turbines which by the way kill exponentially fewer birds than cats or glass fronted buildings or climate change and the sound of them (the turbines not the cats) does not cause cancer. But we digress. Truly we don’t despise old-school Republicans that we used to have a lot of in New England, we just don’t vote for them. Especially not nowadays, while there’s a literal Orange Turd of Spite in the White (power) House.

 

 

Once again in Massachusetts, all the state-level offices are uncontested. Tarr is going to remain State Senator, Ferrante will remain State Representative, Eileen Duff will remain on the Governor’s Council. AND, wait for it, Pamela Casey O’Brien will remain the Register of Probate which most of you didn’t even know was an elected position until you saw it on the ballot because she’s been in this position since 1996. Seriously. 

 

But we know you aren’t here because of who isn’t in a fight.

You’re looking for the action, that sweet, sweet Clamalysis of how to vote where it matters. 

Well, climb out of that bat-filled cave and join us as we attempt to avert an actual apocalypse.

 

Let’s work our way up shall we? 

The 6th District House seat is currently held by Seth Moulton – as some of you may have noticed he was not successful in his presidential campaign and he once again decided that being a Congressman was a fine way to serve the people. Despite a lot of Democratic activists being royally pissed at him for his dalliance with the Oval Office, Moulton has a good crew running the district offices. Lucky for him this pesky pandemic kept his challengers from getting traction so Representative (still) Moulton won the nomination and will again be the Democratic nominee. His GOP opponent is John Paul Moran (using all three names is important to him). Moran has distinguished himself by driving a massive red, white, and blue pickup truck and having his allies put signs in public spaces illegally. We’re going to go out on a limb here and say that even though we were pretty annoyed by the Moulton for President pretension, we’d rather have him around than another Trump loving guy with a thing for threes.  

The Clam endorses Seth Moulton for another term in Congress, and we hope he got the message that we want him to focus on the task at hand.

 

 

In the Senate, Ed Markey became the cool uncle of the progressive youth (and a big majority of Team Clam was on his side in the primary). He beat Joe Kennedy by a margin that surprised us all. On the Republican side, Kevin O’Connor beat Perennial (two failures, two write-in campaigns, and too many lawsuits) Candidate Shiva Ayyadurai. We hope O’Connor will be rewarded for his efforts by losing to Markey. 

We here at the Clam happily endorse Ed Markey for another term in the Senate.

 

For President, who whoo shocker: We’re all in for Joe Biden. 

Truth be told, most of the Clam Editorial Board was for Bernie, but that’s not how the primaries went and Biden won. Handily. 

Joe Biden isn’t the most exciting guy on the planet. He’s not going to provide 24/7 entertainment. In fact he’s kinda boring. He believes in diplomacy. He mentors kids with stutters. He prefers conversations to shouting matches. If you want someone in a polo shirt who’ll burn everything to the ground with tiki torches he’s not your guy. 

It turns out Biden is profoundly decent, thoughtful, and empathetic. He cares about people other than himself. Isn’t that enough? But wait there’s more!

He listens to experts and scientists, takes advice, and is willing to change his mind if given facts that justify it. As President, he’ll be a breath of fresh air by not making news cause he’s rage-tweeting. Will he listen to the progressive wing of the party? Absolutely. Will he be giving us everything we want? Nope. But will we make progress toward the shit we care about as a society under a Biden presidency? Praise The Great Flying Spaghetti Monster we will. Biden will help America once again be a country that the rest of the world looks at to lead, not the meme that gets laughed at in international conferences. 

Make America America Again. Vote for Joe Biden. We are.

 

Look, we know there are a few of you still considering casting your vote for a third party candidate. Fuck your principles. We live in a two-party system that’s at risk of becoming a one not-very-fun-party-at-all system if we don’t overwhelmingly vote his Orangeassholeness out of office. We get it, you want to vote for Phil Collins at the top of the Prohibition ticket, or Kanye and his Birthday Party. But listen. Even Bernie Sanders is voting for Joe Biden.

 

As one of our heroes, Sir Patrick Stewart said,

“It is what you do from now on that will either move our civilization forward a few tiny steps, or else… begin to march us steadily backward.”

 

YES; VOTE.

YES, VOTE YES. On all of them! 

YES, It matters

 

Clam Out.