In the Voting Booth, No One Knows You're a Dog

Ssssshhhhh, come here. I want to tell you a secret.

You know the saying, "On the internetz, no one knows you're a dog?"

Well, in the voting booth, no one knows you're a dog either.

A lot's been said about the Bradley effect  here, and here, where whites asked if they'll vote for Obama lie to polltakers. It's a question that clouds the candidacy of every African American running for elected office no matter their record of achievement, partisan affiliation, or the fact that largely white states populated by Iowans, Wisconsinites, and the many many white people of California all voted for Obama. And not only were these intrepid white people *not* struck down by lightning, they felt better, looked an average of 5-9 years younger, any lingering back problems went away, and their skin cleared up immediately. (I can see you through the computer screen, and You. Look. Marvelous.)

Polls are only as reliable as people are honest. And who's going to tell a pollster, a total stranger, "I'd never vote for a black man"? Only a really really hard-core person who can't get past race. (As we heard from Mary in Nebraska, unfortunately, there are more than a few of those people around everywhere. But even they might not want to say what they really think and feel to someone they don't already know.)

That's why at MOMocrats we have a category called "Polls, Shmolls."

We don't take polls as gospel. Instead they're brief snapshots of what some people who happen to be listed in phone directories with landlines have to say at any given moment.

But, secret dissenters of the world, this whispered message is for you.

I call this the "Scout Finch/To Kill a Mockingbird" effect.

The "Fried Green Tomatoes" method of quiet assertion. Via girls who grill, no less.

The "Speak Your Piece, Edith Bunker!" strategem.

In each of these cases, perfectly nice, independently-minded people--surrounded by very often loud, obnoxious, and sometimes related-by-blood-or-marriage bigots--are shouted down until a few strong-minded people stand up for what they believe.

It might be 2008, but perhaps a similar ugly sentiment we all thought was long dead has emerged at the family get-together. Anyone who says otherwise is made fun of by vocal blowhards in the supermarket. Made to feel uncomfortable by comments at the mom's group.

You know that you're in for an uphill slog if you tried to buck family, community, workplace, church, and region. Maybe you've even voiced a small dissent that hat tips truth: "He's Christian, you know," or "You'd pay less taxes under his plan than McCain's..." only to have someone whose mind has slammed shut try to close your mind too.

So maybe in some cases, the wisest course is not to rail and hit back, but to know your own mind and heart. There will be others in your family, your community, your workplace, church or region who believe as you do. They will be quietly and firmly registering their votes for Obama-Biden '08 too. (And you can find them before you vote at the "Neighbor to Neighbor" tool at BarackObama.com/n2n.)

Sometimes it seems as if the bullies of the world bluster long and loud for their way. (Ahem, any correlation to the fact that these mouthy yobs are often men, and the people they try to shut down are women?) And bullies win all too often. But the beauty of One Person, One Vote is that you can, in the privacy and sacredness of the voting booth, make your views known. You don't have to be stepped on or shouted down.

You can say yes to a different vision of the world. You can imagine a better world, one where we're one step closer to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream that we're seen not for the color of our skin, but the content of our character. A world where the best candidate--best combination of experience, character, judgment, and vision--happens to be an African American man.

In the hushed quiet of the voting booth, you can say "Yes we can" even if a vocal few others around you are saying "I'll be damned if I do." Because you know what? Decibel level does not equal truth, or a consensus.

This is an election when every single vote counts. Every one. Use it. Be counted. Set aside all the hoo-ha about electoral colleges and red, blue or purple states. Vote your conscience, vote your beliefs. Vote on what kind of America we'll live in for the next four years: a lying, bullying, winner-take-all-and-devil-take-the-hindmost, might-makes-right kind of place?

Or a country where we each have the right to try for the "pursuit of happiness" and the opportunity to make the most of what we have? Together we can have impact if all people who stand up to blowhards--and ugly loudmouths trying to define everyone else's reality--all stand up together.

We who love our country passionately--it's time to take it back. Let's call this The Obama Effect.

Because in the voting booth, no one knows you're a yellow (or a blue) dog Democrat.

Cynematic blogs at P i l l o w b o o k.