I ended up not voting for anyone. Someone pledged money and then backed out, and I couldn’t bring myself to vote for Arabs. If something bad happened I didn’t want it on my conscience that I voted. There was an article, I think on Zerohedge, a few days ago about common statist arguments. One of them was “If you don’t vote, you have no right to complain.” The truth is exactly the opposite.
Ah, I found it. Here it is, originally on Liberty.me. Google really is an awesome search engine.
“If you don’t vote, you have no right to complain”
This is exactly wrong. People who do not vote are the only people who have a right to complain. Those who vote for people who win elections are endorsing politicians and their minions who will engage in activities under color of law that would be punished as crimes if you or I did them. Those who vote for people who lose elections may not be vicariously responsible for the crimes of state agents in the same degree, but participating in the system helps to create the appearance of legitimacy for that which is inherently illegitimate.
I did not vote, therefore I have a right to complain. If you voted, you have no right to complain.
So anyway, God has his own plans, I don’t know what they are, so whatever I think is good and bad about these results is irrelevant. But for what it’s worth, here’s what makes me happy (relatively) and what makes me less happy, in my own superficial emotional responses to larger pictures that are not presented to my eye directly by the Creator of the Universe.
First, Bennett can go blank my blank. He’s dead, his party is dead, it’s back to Mafdal sectoral nonsense, he has no future, he’s gone, goodbye. (Wry smile by me.)
Second, Eli Yishai is out, he can also go blank my blank. He’s never coming back, he will disintegrate into obscurity, good bye, good riddance, now go do your speaking rounds because there’s nothing else anyone will hire you for. The biggest Hillul Hashem in the Knesset, in my opinion, for specifically religious Jews (Netanyahu is the biggest for Jews in general) is out. No more hearing about how the gay people caused massive fires in the Carmel and other lovely gems.
Third, Baruch Marzel, who would have been the magnet for the “all nationalist Jews are crazy” mantra, is also out. That will save many a Hillul Hashem for nationalist Jews down the line.
Fourth, Tzipi Livni is again relegated to a loss. She’s the new Shimon Peres and I hope she looks for yet another stupid party to crash after Likud, Kadima, Tnua, now Labor. Or Zionists, or whatever they want to call themselves.
Fifth, Lieberman is dead. He’ll be absorbed by something, and Yisrael Beiteinu is dead. That’s good.
As for what makes me relatively sadder for today at least, Netanyahu’s, I admit it, pretty impressive victory, my two conclusions are, really, there is nobody else who fits the bill of Prime Minister except Feiglin of course, but he’s on hiatus right now. Anyone else filling that seat is, admittedly, laughable.
Second, the only way he will ever stop leading the Israelis government is in the event of a global economic catastrophe that everybody blames him for. Otherwise, he’s going to be Prime Minister until he dies (not calling for any violence here), and he’s got really top notch longevity genes in his family. His father died at what, 102 or something like that?
Yup, 102. Google gets it again. So it’s either economic catastrophe, or King Bibi for another 36 years give or take.
The Jewish Libertarian 
Many true Libertarian prefers a king over a democratic leader- a king knows he can loot you over many years and wants to hand over the looting rights to his successor. a democratic leader has to loot you in a few short years. So maybe King Bibi (Ugh!) isn’t so bad.
not that I think he has a chance to stay in power when the bloated debt, Zirp and welfare state will implode.
Feiglin is going to lose big-time. Bayit Yehudi lost this election because of the spectre of The Zionists becoming the biggest party. Meanwhile, Bibi campaigned on changing the method, presumably to his idea of Only the Biggest Party should be allowed to form the government. If he gets his way, nobody will ever vote for a small party again, for fear of handing the elections to the left (or right). Since Feiglin will start off as a small party, he will never come near to winning. He should have stuck with Likud, since the voters who switched to Bayit Yehudi will be coming back pretty soon and would have gotten him his knesset seat (and leadership platform) back.
A pessimistic analysis. Admittedly the optimistic one would note that if Kahlon can get 10 votes in this election, Feiglin should be able to get at least 15 in subsequent ones, and maybe miraculously he could jump from there to the 30 votes needed to present a leadership bid. Also if the left splinters again there will be less fear so maybe. Also if the right gets fed up enough with the Likud, say after Netanyahu’s retirement, some of them could conceivably decide that whatever, let’s vote Zehut in.
Well, in my view of things, which may be right or may be crazy, but it just might be a lunatic you’re looking for, is that the entire world is about to change dramatically over the next five months so you can throw all these analyses in the toilet.
On Saturday night (Friday to Saturday that is) I dreamed Bibi drunk hugging me (!ha?) like I was a child and he was crying. And I got mad at him for holding me and I told him that He is My Baby not the other way around. He did not reply. Later I had a vision of him swaying drunk with I knew was vodka and I felt a sparrow through my heart that poor Bibi drinks too much. He’s like a retired general with a vision of war for anything he has to solve and he fills in the shoes of a leader because he’s afraid of the mess “a civilian” would do.
Maybe that’s why he went to elections this year around too, because he doesn’t trust what anyone else would do. I was under the impression he was preparing and nursing Bennett, but if he trusted Bennett Bibi would not have run to clear way for his protege…
I think the reaction of the US Senate was epiphany to him. Not sure if he can figure out what next. There was one picture where Bibi had a deep scowl on his face and his eyes were on fire, it was as if some Archangel was showing him a shocking truth, he seemed transfigured. No emotional sighs or smirks…
Yes what you said about complaining is correct. I don’t know why everyone else just says it’s the other way around. You vote for someone you can’t complain about them. But of course it’s liberating when voters complain about the elected one too, and democracy isn’t working when they just stick with the leader like he was the air we breathe. It’s called growing up..
Don’t be too sad about Bibi. His victory is somewhat impressive. It definitely improves his vice grip hold on power in Likud, especially with all the gloomy polls. But it’s also very likely any government he could form would be of fairly short duration, like the last one. That’s a pretty ungovernable mess he’s got there.
It also seems his support is a mile wide and an inch deep. No one particularly likes him, but there’s no alternative. It may take several election cycles, but Feiglin is patient, and he is quite capable of portraying himself as a palatable, and, eventually, preferable, option.