You Didn't Vote for Nikki Haley To Be Your Governor

If you’re anything like my friends on Facebook (and why aren’t you?), you’re probably upset that Nikki Haley beat Vincent Sheheen in the South Carolina governor’s race last Tuesday. But if you’re one of the 689,319 people in South Carolina who did vote for her, you’re probably pretty happy right now.

There’s just one problem. If you’re a Republican, you didn’t vote for Nikki Haley to be your governor. You voted for her to be the governor of everyone else.

Most people believe that when they vote, they’re expressing an opinion or picking a leader. But if that were the case, you wouldn’t need to vote. You could just tell everybody you liked Nikki Haley, buy a bunch of stickers, lie about voting, and go for a walk instead. Later, you could call her up and ask her to boss you around. So why didn't you?

Because that’s not how voting works. Voting isn’t how we pick leaders for ourselves. It’s not even how we pick leaders for everyone. It’s how we pick leaders for everyone else. It’s how we force rules and rulers on those who don’t already agree. If your candidate lost, this is bad news. It means Republicans picked your ruler. How could we blame them? You were trying to pick theirs.

You do have one option. If you’re one of the 510,230 people who voted for Vincent Sheheen, just call him up and ask him to tell you what to do. If you're sad that Thomas Ravenel was defeated by Lindsey Graham (R-Closet), just follow him on Twitter and ask him to write some legislation for your life.

What’s stopping you?