The Bitchtucci Voter Guide: General Election 2020

Portland, Oregon

life’s rather tough. um. please enjoy this painting of some goldfish

As a teenager, I was drawn to politics, I think, because of the way things felt so large: cycles of struggle, virtues and ideals on the line, defeat or victory, and repeat. For a kid with anxious, over-analytical energy seeking to explain why things felt unfair to my friends or my family, it was almost addictive to follow the rise and fall of political campaigns. That repetitive, emotional crescendo while material realities remain stagnant or even suffocating is what makes politics exhausting to follow for those whose lives are most impacted by being overlooked or negatively targeted. This feels particularly resonant when we zoom out and confront — every day, in some way or another, I hope — that these capitalist and white supremacist superstructures rarely allow for virtues or victories to seed.

As I have gotten older and learned from brilliant community organizers, workers, mothers, teachers, counselors, students, friends, partners, and more, I have grown to see politics less and less as a zero-sum game. It’s true that we have some agency and a responsibility to take care of one another by pulling against the most insidious forces of greed, but it’s also true that we don’t have to fight every single fight in the political arena as presented to us. These fights will be here for us. They are multi-generational fights and they are fought differently, in different spaces, in different ways, every day. If you don’t have the space to get soulsucked into every candidate or ballot measure, you are well within your rights to leave lines blank. We can pick and choose where we put our attention and energy. Not all causes are created equal and if campaigns have not convinced you of their worth, this is often a flaw with the campaign, not with you.

You don’t need me to tell you this, but here’s what I gnaw on when there’s nothing else to eat. If you are able to stay engaged with being honest and kind to those in your community, with being in solidarity with one another in ways that express real, felt love, with being flexible enough to apologize when you get things wrong, with noticing shimmering ordinary beauty when it crosses your path, with safeguarding your finite energy if you are a person whose identities mean you are routinely targeted for mistreatment in the world, with extending your capacity beyond what you thought possible if you are a person whose identities have protected you from struggle, this is what matters most.

If you have it in you to weigh in on this election, to extend your care with the goal of bending these corrupt structures closer to the ground where they might even inadvertently cast shade upon our weariest, welcome. I’m nobody, but I want to tell you what I’ve learned.

On to business:

I especially want to highlight the following organizations and their voting guidance. Whereas I am merely a scrub, these organizations are conduits between people and policy change every day of the year:

PCUN’s statewide endorsements on their social media in English and Spanish. Really great considerations for SALEM, HILLSBORO, and other parts of Oregon!

APANO’s guide is beautifully illustrated and comes in English, Chinese, Korean, Tagalog, and Spanish, and highlights inspiring candidates and issues all across the state of Oregon. Jackie Leung for House District 19!!!

Street Roots’ election coverage always rules.

Washington County Ignite’s voter guide. Nafisa Fai, y’all!!! WashCo Commission, let’s gooooo!

Next Up Oregon’s endorsements.

East County Rising’s endorsements. Shoutout to Eddy Morales for Mayor of Gresham!!!

I also consulted:

Candidates

Ballot Measures
An umbrella consideration for you, apple of my eye, voter in my community. SO MANY BALLOT MEASURES HERE SHOULD TAX CORPORATIONS INSTEAD OF TAXPAYERS. But for YEAAAAAAAARS, the richest corporations in Oregon have killed bill after bill that would hold them to account through wildly misleading ads and elaborate lobbying strategies. The ratio of tax responsibilities in our state is all fucked up. This level of financial burden for basic services should not be dumped onto the laps of taxpayers. Our laps should be reserved only for cute puppies or cute girls. HELLO.
But once the problems get bad enough (On this ballot alone: Toxic ventilation in schools! Crumbling roads and wild traffic jams! Absolutely racist disproportionalities in access to preschool! People dying from tobacco-related health conditions! And so on!), weaker versions of legislation make it to the ballot, and because voters tend to agree that our communities need schools and libraries, we keep passing them and agreeing to higher taxes. I’m down to pay taxes for the common good, but I want all of us to understand the root cause of higher taxes in our state. It ain’t Democrats raising taxes. It’s Republicans and their corporate cronies sneaking out of paying basic tax responsibilities, and Democrats trying to stop the bleeding and keep roads paved. Dems also have a long way to go toward ridding themselves of corporate influence and fighting harder against weak-ankled bothsidesing, hemming and hawing and producing compromise way further to the right than constituents want. But our state is nearly at a breaking point with this corporate fairyland shit. Please take every opportunity to vote and pressure policymakers in such a way that cuts through misleading corporate-funded lies and lifts the financial tax burden away from the average Oregonian. I plan to restate this point ad-nauseam throughout this section of the guide because it APPLIES yet we seem to FORGET.

Um wow, have a glass of water and stretch ya neck.
I hope this was helpful to you. Thanks for reading and sharing.
There are so many causes and people who need financial support. If in your budgeting it makes sense to throw my mama some rent $$, you can find me on cash/venmo/paypal @marissayangbertucci.
Love ya, learn so much from you, grateful to be scraping away at the fights that matter with you,
xoxo,
bitchtucci

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undefeated in scrabble since 1999 | insta @marissayangbertucci

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