I've been reading Hillary Clinton's What Happened these past few days, and regardless of what Mrs. Clinton is arguing, it's got me thinking long and hard about the 2020 Presidential elections; the first elections that I will be able to vote in. I, of course, plan to uphold my civic duty. (If you're not registered to vote, take a quick detour and head over to this link and get yourself registered!!)

So, I plan to stay involved in the race and stay on top of campaign news. Mind you, I'm planning on focusing on the actual issues and policies, not the horse race, which is why I'm starting to educate myself on the issues now, to get a head start.

In my quest for the issues, I also looked up who the prospective candidates might be. Included in the list were some interesting figures, like Joe Biden, who says he'll run if he feels no one else qualified is running for his party, Marc Cuban, who is waiting until the midterm to feel out the prospects, Elizabeth Warren, who I'm very excited about and whose Twitter is straight fire, and Oprah Winfrey, who has declined running for President but about whom speculation still continues.

The Washington Post says that even though Oprah says she's not interested, the American public thinks she could beat out Trump if she wanted to.

Honestly, that's probably true. She's been working so hard to combat sexual harassment and assault, as her Golden Globes speech shows us, and millions of Americans believe that she would be an outstanding candidate for the Oval Office.

I agree.

She's talented, she's incredibly smart and sharp, she's shrewd, she's passionate, and she's fighting for the right things.

But obviously, there's a lot more to the job than that, and Oprah recognizes that. Still, Americans think she's got what it takes. If they don't think that, then they at least think she fits the, "Anybody but Trump," sentiment. Who knows? She might change her mind.

That got me thinking, would I vote for her?

Don't get me wrong, I love Oprah, but I have a small personal grudge against her. Namely, the Oprah Chai Latte at Starbucks. I doubt anyone even remembers this but it's one of the (many) things in life that really, really irks me because, in my mind, this is cultural appropriation. Oprah had this cool opportunity to workshop a new drink with Starbucks, and so she decided to make a chai latte, infused with cinnamon, ginger, cardamom, and cloves.

Wow, sounds super similar to what I drink every day, a drink from my mother-country, India. Hmm.

If you want to know how important chai is to me, take a gander at this article I wrote, Chai Is Not Just About Sipping Something Delicious. In it, I try to explain why I consider this drink to be a sacred part of my Indian cultural identity. So naturally, I found it just a bit upsetting when Oprah called this chai drink her own invention. Like OK cool, you make it and drink it every morning and whatever, but how about crediting where you got that recipe from or who you were inspired by?

And so just like that, Oprah took my sacred drink, distilled it into a syrup and pumped it out of pump bottles so that Starbucks could turn it for a profit, without a single word of attribution to where that concoction originally comes from. Sad.

Ever since then, I've always been reserved with my praise for Oprah. So, would I vote for her?

Over Trump? Absolutely. Clearly. Of course. That's not even a question.

The reason is that I'm made of multiple identities and some identities just have to take precedence over others. Here, my identity as an American citizen with civic duty takes miles of precedence over my butt-hurt identity as an Indian. Dear God, of course, it does.

My identity as a woman within this country takes precedence, my identity as a person of color, as a supporter of equal rights for all, as a supporter of basic sanity and human decency takes precedence. It doesn't mean that my identity as an Indian American isn't important to me. Of course, it is.

But some things are just more important than that.

Easily, I'd vote for Oprah any day. Because the state of our country demands that we put away our minute differences, our petty vendettas, and our grudges, and do what's right for our homeland.

Time to keep America great, boys. Let's get to work.