On Tuesday, former undersecretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs under George W. Bush James K. Glassman wrote a piece for The New York Times in which he suggested that Republicans who find Donald Trump unpalatable must vote instead for Hillary Clinton.
That’s a ridiculous contention.
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The problem with Glassman’s case is precisely the same as the problem with the binary decision-making model of voting proposed by many Trump supporters: a vote isn’t just an instrument of policymaking. It’s a sign of moral approval. Voting for Hillary to stop Trump means buying into her agenda, her persona, her character. It means signing off on her as a rational and decent choice for the White House. She simply isn’t. The same is true for Trump.
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In this election, like all elections, voting isn’t just about Stop Trump or Stop Hillary. It’s about voting in favor of the person of whom you approve. And it is not only perfectly valid, it may be morally preferable, to say that you approve of none of these people than it is to approve of one bad option to stop the other. The Kantian categorical imperative would suggest that if we all voted merely to stop the worst evil, we’d end up with the second-worst evil. But if we all voted as an instrument of moral approval, we’d end up with options we actually like.
So no, those conservatives who won’t vote Trump shouldn’t vote for Hillary. That defeats the purpose of not voting for Trump: it endorses all the things you hate about Trump, since Hillary is all of them and worse.
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No, Conservatives Who Oppose Trump SHOULD NOT Vote For Hillary https://t.co/N490tWbCAB pic.twitter.com/CJo07lhYpT
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) September 6, 2016
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