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WHO SHOULD I VOTE FOR THIS ELECTION?

That is the question I receive closer to every election day. My friends, family, acquaintances ask me for my opinion. The thing is that I rarely have an answer for them. I can provide quite cogent explanations for who I will be voting for, but I don't know who YOU should vote for.

Each year individuals are surprised by what follows their uttering of that question. I ask "What are your most important values?" "How do you judge people, by past performance or by what they say?" "How do you think people make decisions; by deeply held values or by incentives and disincentives?"

They are often surprised that I don't push a particular candidate. They are also surprised that I don't strategize much; by that I mean, I don't choose a candidate based on "viability" or campaign slogans or fundraising ability. I choose candidates whose priorities are similar to mine.

Here is the thing, I am old and I am deeply concerned about my legacy on this earth. I want to know that when I die, I did everything in my power to change the world into one that I believe to be fairer. I will have failed at life if I didn't practice my values. So I stopped strategizing-because all that means is that I will be choosing candidates based on what I think are other people's values and not my own. I also realized after many years that the only certainty in politics is that people with my values will not win if I don't support them. At my age I also want to see how much you have walked the talk, not just how loudly you have talked the talk.

In other words, I don't know who you should vote for. Only YOU could know that because only YOU know what your values are, and what you would like your legacy to be.

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