Who Are These Professors Voting For, And Why? Emerson, George, Halvorson, Nieli and Singer 6 comments Editor’s note: The usual disclaimer applies--the opinions expressed below are the authors’ own and do not necessarily represent the views of Princeton University, Whig-Clio, or The Soap Box. Members of the faculty who wish to submit a paragraph or two explaining their support for any candidate should send an email to us. We will post submissions as they come in. Caryl Emerson Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures I’m voting for John Kerry. In politics I am not a sentimentalist. The sincerity and religious confession of a leadership is its own private matter. Where we should take stock of the Bush administration and its corporate allies is in its public record, which is a moral disaster and evil in its fruits: greed, deception, ineptitude, manipulation of fear, fiscal failure (except toward themselves), indifference toward the welfare of humans and environments, violation of the Beatitudes on a daily basis. As a humanist teaching other times and places, it matters to me that America’s greatness not be strapped to a willed ignorance about other world cultures-their interests, perspectives, languages, needs and values. Although I’m voting for Kerry largely for what he hopes to defeat, he impresses me as a person of thoughtfulness and integrity. America is a big ship to sober up, educate, and turn around, but it would be a start. Robert George Department of Politics I am voting for President Bush for many reasons, not least because I believe that if given the opportunity he will nominate Supreme Court justices who will faithfully interpret the Constitution. As I see it, the country has suffered for decades from judicial edicts embodying liberal ideology masquerading as constitutional principles. The judicial usurpation of legislative authority has often produced rulings that are substantively unjust, and has sapped the spirit and weakened the institutions of American democracy. Although it is true that many of the judges and justices responsible for decisions such as Roe v. Wade were appointed by Republican presidents, I believe that President Bush will do better. His appointees to the federal district courts and courts of appeal have been excellent. And there is now a large pool of judicial talent from which he can draw in selecting Supreme Court nominees. I recognize, of course, that the concern about judicial appointments that weighs for me so heavily in favor President Bush will count for the majority of people in liberal communities like Princeton as a reason to oppose him. They must vote according to their consciences; I according to mine. Another reason I am supporting President Bush is his policy on embryo-destructive biomedical research. He opposes, as I do, the use of taxpayer dollars for research involving the destruction of nascent human life. He supports legislation pending in the Congress that would forbid the creation of embryos by cloning, either for implantation and gestation to birth or for experimentation in which they would be killed. On another important "social issue," I support the President's call for a constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman. On this definition, President Bush and Senator Kerry agree. Both candidates oppose "same-sex marriage." However, Senator Kerry says that a constitutional amendment is not needed to prevent courts from redefining marriage. As the experience of his home state of Massachusetts shows, however, this is a dubious claim. On the war in Iraq, I believe that whoever is elected--Bush or Kerry--will pursue essentially the same policy. Senator Kerry promises to put together a broader international coalition, but I don't think this is realistic. Recently I heard a Kerry surrogate say that Kerry, if elected, would increase our troop strength in Iraq, but I'm skeptical about that, too. Turning to other issues of foreign policy, I believe that President Bush is on the right track in the fight against AIDS in Africa, and is making a genuine effort to prevent a Rwanda-type genocide in Darfur, Sudan. Of course, there are many other important issues, including what to do about nuclear programs in North Korea and Iran, taxation and economic policy, immigration, trade, social security reform, health care, the faith-based initiative and other issues pertaining to the delivery of social services, the Patriot Act, the death penalty, and environmental protection. I agree with the President's policies in some of these areas, though not all. I have never found a candidate for public office with whom I agree on everything. Nor do I demand one. On Tuesday, I will cheerfully cast my ballot for President Bush. Hans Halvorson Department of Philosophy I think that there is a danger at a university like Princeton that students will be overly influenced by their professors' opinions on fundamental issues (ethical, religious, political), when their professors should stick to teaching students to think critically for themselves. Although The Soap Box would want me to explain my *reasons* for voting for a certain candidate, I think that would not remove the danger that at least one student will reason as follows: professor X is voting for Y, and professor X is an authority, so that is a reason to vote for Y. Russ Nieli Lecturer, Department of Politics As a single-issue right-to-life fanatic (SIRF), I surely have less difficulty than most in deciding for whom to vote in Tuesday's presidential election. Us SIRFs (pronounced "serfs") believe that the abortion issue is of such transcendent moral import that a candidate's stance on it can be largely dispositive of how we vote. Not since the slavery and free soil issue of the 1840s and 1850s has a moral issue achieved a salience among a sizable group of voters as the abortion issue does today, and right-to-lifers like myself believe that there has never been a controversy in more recent times that combines so momentous a human rights issue -- i.e. the right not to be slaughtered in one's mother's womb -- with so clear a distinction between right and wrong. Enough is enough! Politicians who do nothing to try to stop the ongoing killing of over one million unborn children each year will never receive our vote. I personally will cast my vote for any mainstream candidate, from the most liberal Democrat to the most conservative Republican, who articulates a clear anti-abortion stance if the candidate's opponent waffles on the issue or takes the opposite position. The Democrats haven't fielded a pro-life presidential candidate since Jimmy Carter, and it doesn't look like they will be doing so again any time soon. So for me the choice is easily for Bush. If some younger version of a Jimmy Carter or a Hugh Carey were to run against someone like Christy Whitman or George Pataki, I would in an instant vote for the Democrat (even though I support the Republican position on a majority of issues). Right-to-life crazies like me have a very parsimonious decision rule. Peter Singer University Center for Human Values I support Kerry for President because Bush’s policies are morally incoherent and the outcome is, quite simply, a disaster. He claims that his respect for a “culture of life” prevents him from allowing federal funds to be used on research that destroys a few surplus human embryos, but he has started an unnecessary war that has killed more than ten thousand Iraqi civilians, as well as over a thousand American soldiers. Under Bush, America has been a poor global citizen, sidelining the United Nations and selfishly refusing to support important global initiatives like the Kyoto Protocol and the International Criminal Court. Famously, the United Nations, and not Bush, proved to be right on Iraq: the inspectors should have been allowed more time to do their work. Bush called Saddam a liar, but it is Bush who has now been shown to have been wrong on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction. American credibility can only be restored by electing new president.

READ COMMENTS (most recent first) | Post comment Rachel '08: to Anonymous (the most recent one)--it is not a "religious belief" but a biological fact that life begins at conception--even Peter Singer admits that. In almost every biology textbook in the country it says that life begins at conception. Therefore abortion is not about a woman controlling her own body, because the baby is not a part of her uterus, but a separate human being. Also, this is about right and wrong, not religion. To protect the life of innocent people should always be a role of the government and not confined to private life. Do you believe murder is wrong? that is a moral belief, yet it's okay to impose that on society, but it's not okay to say whether or not abortion is wrong! Anonymous: In response to anonymous 2, I just want to clarify a few points: I understand the religious belief that life begins at conception, though I do not share that belief. But it has no place in the laws of a nation founded by those escaping religous persecution. If you believe that abortion is wrong, don't get one. Work for a more just and equal society where poverty does not force women to have abortions and where teenagers have adequate sex education. But keep Christianity out of the constitution and out of the courts. It belongs in your church and in your family life. Besides your own belief about abortion and Roe v. Wade, my point was simple: When choosing a candidate for president, an educated, well-informed citizen would consider a multitude of issues. Believe my, the neo-conservatives don't care what happens with Roe v. Wade. They're using the issue to divide us into Red and Blue (as you could see in the election results) where the red states suffer enormously under the president and the republican representatives and senators, but they vote based on a single religious belief (or perhaps 2 if you include the issue of gay marriage, even though Kerry opposes gay marriage). I recommend Thomas Frank's "What's the Matter with Kansas?" an excellent read on this very topic. As for the profession of teaching, my mother is an inner-city high school teacher, so I am very familiar with how hard teachers work, and the wonderful service they give to the community. But they ought to be treated in kind. Instead they have been left behind by LNCB and in turn, their students are left behind. I have the utmost respect for teachers. I simply argue that we should be attracting more good teachers like my mom with better salaries, benefits, and training. tma07: Kudos to the Soap Box people. This was a great article. I am so sick of reading the elementary rhetoric of the media that it was refreshing to read political opinions on those who have made studying politics their lives. Plus, it shows that there really are some conservative professors out there. Robert Glasgow: I think that the issues with embryonic stem-cell research is clouded by angre rhetoric. No matter your stance on abortion (I can understand both sides of the issue), you have to realise that it has nothing to do with ESCR. Now I'm not a science major, just an interested amateur, but from what I've read from Nature and Scientific American is that almost all (if not all) ESCR going on in the US before President Bush's block on Federal Funding was on excess IVF cells. IVF, by its very nature, requires extra embryoes just in case the early ones don't implant. These fertilized embryoes are inserted in batches; however, there are almost invariably a number leftover. This is where things diverge - in the pre-block system these embryoes would be used in research. In the post-block system they're just incinerated. Therefore there is no way to save these embryoes - they're either used or destroyed. I like to think that I would die trying to do something then simply be killed for nothing. Of course, this is coming from a Canadian. anonymous 2: because embryos are people too. i find it extremely distressing that you would so roundly and absolutely dismiss a moral concern shared not only by these professors and half of america, but many of your fellow students who believe life begins at conception. moreover, i think it's sad you assume people wouldn't be teachers "these days" just because teachers are not treated as well as you would be treated as an i-banker. maybe that just means you have to re-evaluate your secular priorities. Anonymous: I find it extremely distressing that two prominent professors of politics could choose a president based on his policy regarding simply one issue, especially when that president would deny a woman the right to control her own uterus while possibly sending my ALREADY BORN older brother to war. There is every indication that the current administration will continue to kill innocent people around the world and sacrifice our nation's extremely valuable military men and women for Haliburton profits, while allowing deaths in our own nation to rise as a result of increased poverty and lack of healthcare. I would also hope that in an institution of higher learning, professors might understand the repercussions of the Bush administration's education policies. There is something fundamentally unfair and unjust to EXPECT more of teachers while PROVIDING less funding, less training, less salary and fewer benefits. I wonder if our professors would teach at Princeton if they were forced to deal with similar treatment. Just look around at Princeton's student body. How many of us would be public school teachers the way teachers are treated these days? These are just some of the issues that I consider when deciding for which candidate I will vote. I suppose I can't disagree with Russ Nieli's self description: a "right-to-life crazy". Why in the world do oil companies and embryos need to be protected when more people have fallen into poverty, the middle class is losing good-paying jobs, education is grossly underfunded, we have too few allies in the war in Iraq and Afghanistan is now controlled by terrorists and drug lords? I suppose I just expected our very intelligent professors of politics to at least consider these issues of equal, if not more, import than overturning Roe v. Wade. Post a comment Name or nickname: Or comment via email.

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