Politics is so often compared to sports because the two activities have so much in common, including recruiting players/candidates, scouting the other team/opposition research, getting your own team psyched up/speeches and rallies, even trash talking/negative ads. And after the game/election, there’s always a winner and a loser.
Americans love competitors, but they usually don’t like losers. Losing is a painful, humiliating experience. The fear of failure has kept many a starting quarterback and candidate up late at night. Actual failure means going over the same plays/campaigns over and over again, trying to figure out exactly where you went wrong, knowing you probably blew the biggest opportunity of your lifetime — in public.
But there wouldn’t be sport — or democracy — without people brave enough to take the chance.
The day after an election is the time to thank the losers for putting themselves out there for the rest of us to judge — and reject. People like mayoral candidate Nestor Djonkam, who found more abject poverty and hopelessness in some parts of his adopted city than in his native Cameroon, and who ran in D.C.’s Democratic primary because he wanted to do something about it. Or like Republican primary candidate Dennis Moore, who was fired from his job at the D.C. Public Schools for “insubordination” because he tried too hard to help a disabled student get to school, and decided D.C. voters needed another vision.
Our deep appreciation goes to the unprecedented number of District residents who stood up and declared they were running for the D.C. Council to be a part of the capital city’s renaissance, only to go down to stinging defeat in the September primaries. They may now be wondering why they ever bothered. But these earnest, passionate also-rans should know that their willingness to serve their community has provided much inspiration to the rest of the District’s residents.
Thanks also to Jeff Stein and Moshe Starkman — two Orthodox Jewish friends running as Republicans in Maryland’s overwhelmingly Democratic to give Montgomery and Prince George’s counties’ voters a ballot choice, whether they wanted one or not. Likewise all the “indies” from the Green, Independent Green and Libertarian parties who gave disaffected voters an alternative to the two major parties and a reason to vote next time.
The winners of Tuesday’s election will bask in victory while the pride-wounded losers, already forgotten, have begun their retreat to private life. But without people who are willing to risk running for office despite the odds, there would be fewer ways for our increasingly diverse citizenry to peacefully express deeply held, but often conflicting, political beliefs and aspirations.
So here’s to the also-rans. Our American system of representative government could not function properly without them.
