OK, I’m exaggerating, but only a little.
I’m old enough to remember lots of American elections. The one, for instance, replacing a president who’d resigned in disgrace. And the time the country stood bitterly divided over the Vietnam War. I even remember an election held as 52 American hostages wallowed in Iran following the botched rescue attempt by a president seeking a second term.
Never, however, have I seen anything quite like what’s happening now; a brutal race between two candidates—each claiming to be the country’s savior—who hate each other’s guts enough to hurl vile epithets ranging from “sleazebag” to “fascist” to worse.
Already, the venomous rhetoric on both sides has inspired at least two assassination attempts and God only knows what will happen after the votes are eventually counted. Which is why I intend to be with likeminded friends on the day that finally happens.
“Political extremism experts warn that the charged atmosphere around the 2024 presidential election has created a highly volatile situation,” Reuters recently reported. Much of America, added Robert Pape, a University of Chicago specialist, is in a political “wildfire season,” featuring “dry combustible material,” ready to burst into “lightning strikes.” And people everywhere on the political spectrum, including some I know, are arming themselves for protection.
All of which is painful to watch for Americans like me who prefer staying on the electoral sidelines. I have already lost two longtime friends to whom I carelessly divulged my political leanings. And while family is important here, it often plays second fiddle to who one supports in elections.
Some of those pained Americans are Filipinos likely to wield a major impact. Many of them, according to a recent New York Times piece headlined “Filipino American Voters Could Decide Key Races…,” live in Nevada, a so-called “swing state” that could help determine who wins.
“We’re not just warm bodies at their campaign events anymore,” Joel Enriquez, a Fil Am business owner in Las Vegas, told the newspaper. “They actually want to engage with us now.”
That engagement has taken many forms, including “Pinoy Pride” billboards for Kamala Harris and Republican candidates attending Filipino community events wearing barongs. Home to a larger percentage of Asian American voters than any other battleground state, Nevada—where the biggest Asian group is Filipino—even features signs marking voting locations in Tagalog.
None of which provides me much succor as I am not Filipino and don’t hail from, nor vote in, Nevada. What comforts me, however, is the knowledge that soon I will be back in the Philippines where elections are calm, polite, noncombative, and civil.
I’m kidding. As anyone who follows Philippine news knows, politicians in that island nation are currently accusing their opponents of being drug addicts and publicly fantasizing about cutting off each other’s heads. Ah, but here’s the difference between there and where I am now; in the Philippines I’m a foreigner. Which means I can’t vote, campaign, or even publicly express strong political opinions without risking deportation or worse.
Truth be told, that suits me just fine. Because in the Philippines—more like home to me now than my native California—I can ignore everything and just live my life. Or, if I’m in the mood, keep my mouth shut and simply enjoy the show.
I certainly hold no ill will towards my homeland. I hope, when this election is over, to see a peaceful transition of power, whoever wins. I’d be lying, though, if I didn’t confess that I’m looking forward to watching it all from afar.
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David Haldane is an award-winning American journalist, author, and radio broadcaster with homes in Joshua Tree, California, and Northern Mindanao, Philippines. His latest book, A Tooth in My Popsicle, is available on Amazon. This column appears weekly in The Manila Times.
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