The Devil’s playbook

It has been said that the Devil has not added anything to his playbook in millennia. Of course one wonders how we would know such a thing. It is true that he seems to pretty much stick to two or three plays, but then since we have not shown that we are willing to consistently defend even these simple tricks, why should he show us anything else until we do?
The US presidential election is now in full swing and the evil one is once again trotting out his old “choice of evils” fallacy.
If you think Sen. Obama would make a good president, then do not let me dissuade you from voting for him; indeed I would not even know where to start. Or if you think Sen. McCain would be an excellent choice for president, then I suppose there really is nothing more to say on the matter. But most the people I know think neither of these things. Many if not most people, it seems, will be trying to choose the “lesser of two evils”. It has been said that choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil. This is true only if there is some other choice available which is better. The best of all available choices must be by definition good, for it is taking one in the best possible direction one can go. If one will not choose the best route because there might be a better one, then one can take no route at all. Indeed, if we had a runoff system and it came down to McCain and Obama then I would dutifully determine to the best of my ability which one best manifested The Good and vote for him. But that is not the situation we have. Regardless of what any one tries to tell us, we have many choices, some probably worse than McCain/Obama some (at least at first glance) look a good deal better, and if you do not think any of the names on the ballot would make a better president than yourself, you can just write your own name in. We have many choices, so in this case choosing the lesser of these two evils is in deed choosing evil; and if we continue choosing evil, we will not only get the evil we chose but our choices will continue to be evil, and the lesser will continue to get worse.