Voted Out

My home state has voters that run mostly blue.  Being a small state geographically, access by voters to those the majority has elected comes much more easily than in places with millions of people but the same number of senators that we have.  Little nobody me has seen virtually all my elected representatives from county coucil to US Senator.  I've spoken to most, written to some, worship with one, and heard all live.  Like everyplace else in America we had our 2018 mass political participation in the form of voting.  I voted a straight ticket, only the second time I have ever done that, knowing that I will be voting against the more personally capable incumbent candidate and knowing that I would be casting my preference against the one candidate that I know best.  By late night, the results were known, Democrats swept statewide and in pretty much in my county, unseating my friend who had been in place for twenty years and a very professional state official who is a pro at the role the previous voters had elected him to do.  Had they worked for me in a company or in a non-profit, their jobs would have been in no danger.  No boss would accuse them of underperformance or undermining company goals or bringing discredit to the firm in any way.  More likely they would have gotten performance bonuses.  But they are not employees of my company.  They are more like contractors sent to fill a position by the Republican Party.  If I do not wish to maintain relations with their sponsor, their fortunes follow.  So two very good public officials of significant tenure and achievement fell victim to their standard bearer in the White House who does his best to create victims, most intended, a few like these men and two people in other districts of long tenure become his victims unwittingly and probably undeserved, though the intentional victims are also mostly undeserved.

This has come up in a different form.  I do not buy Papa John's Pizza, haven't for a while.   I found their pizza inferior the two times I bought some.  The standard bearer's presence favorable or not would not make me a customer and the amount of pizza that I buy would not move the fortunes of any company in any direction.  But I did find some of his public positions offensive and superimposed that on his company.  I do like Barilla pasta.  It always comes out better than Ronzoni or Shop-Rite brand but costs more, so when it went on sale for a comparable price I would get a box or two.  No more.  The spokesman takes a public stance that I find offensive, the gradient between his brand and the other brands is small, and my life and those who eat at my table will be no different whichever brand of pasta goes into the meal.  Barilla is gone.  I do not clip the coupons for it from the weekly circular.  There is never an incentive to divert my money to his pocket to demean groups of people he doesn't like.  I won't knowingly be an accomplice in that.  But my purchases do not change a stock price so if my mutual funds want to own some of the stock, they can buy it for my portfolio.

Who represents you matters.  It is not just a matter of personal competence, which is widely distributed among both parties and among companies with stellar reputations and among companies you choose to shun.  As a physician, my reputation depended on my employers and on the other people within the upper tiers of the organization who create policy.  The political parties are no different, even at the sacrifice of at least two men of real talent and professionalism.