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Finally, let’s say you get the candidate of your heart’s desire and he loses to a liberal D. What do you think the impact would be on the country of, say, 8 years of Rat-dom?

Does character count for anything in your assessment of a candidate for high office? If a man or woman has no character he or she has no place in a position of trust and authority over the nation no matter how personally appealing he or she may seem or what party he or she is part of. If neither candidate has that quality we call character the choice between two evils leaves room for a third candidate who does possess character.

I fully realize that the next president will come from one of the two main parties, but I will be making my choice and will not be "throwing away" my vote if I choose not to vote for either of the major party's' nominees and instead vote for the candidate who best represents my views, beliefs, and hopes for America's future generations.

I have always been under the impression that the right to vote meant that I can choose who to vote for based on which candidate I believe to be the best man or woman for the office in question. Have I been misled, and if so, am I being unAmerican or unpatriotic by choosing to vote my conscience rather than my pocketbook or my party loyalty? If I follow the crowd and vote for my party's unworthy nominee because I know that the worthy candidate who best represents my ideals and beliefs has no chance of being elected, doesn't that make me nothing more than a sheeplike crowd follower?

If neither candidate has that quality we call character the choice between two evils leaves room for a third candidate who does possess character.

You admit that one of the two major party candidates will win the general election. If that choice is a choice between "two evils," do you dispute that it is fundamentally impossible for one evil to not be worse, or potentially worse, than the other? That being the case, how do you find it moral to do nothing to stop the greater of the two evils being visited upon the nation?

I hear your passion for our country, but, again, you admit that the next president will represent one of the two major political parties. How, then, can you conclude that voting for a third party is not a political futile act? Moreover, how, then, can you avoid personal responsibility for engaging in a futile act rather than in an effective act?

I appreciate your eloquence, but this is politics, not poetry. Not even prose. Grubby, realistic politics.

I say of course vote your conscience, but on what should your conscience be focused? What is the task at hand? It is making a choice between two alternatives that were not of your own making, as neither you nor I can control who the parties nominate. And it is a choice as to who is going to be the Commander in Chief and the Leader of the Free World, and, more importantly, a choice as to which party---and their general worldviews---will be elevated to power.

The only way your conscience can be clear is (1) you do all you can to effectively stop the greater of two evils, or (2) you delude yourself that it is moral act to do a futile act when you had the opportunity to do an effective act.

You are not a "sheeplike crowd follower" because you step up to the plate and take the pitch, whatever it is. You are not a "sheeplike crowd follower" because you keep fighting, even up to Election Day, even up to holding your nose mightily, to get the best for the nation between whatever alternatives you're presented with.

Too often "voting one's conscience" really comes down to voting for someone that the voter "feels good" about voting for. But it's not about feeling good. It's about doing the best you can, given the two effective choices you have, for the country.