In 2014, I’ll vote for the best candidate: Eliot Cutler.

In Bonnie Porta’s recent Maine Voices column in support of Mike Michaud (“Michaud campaign says candidate ready to put Mainers’ interests first,“ July 20), she referenced the 2010 gubernatorial election, saying that “I learned some hard but important lessons from that election.”

Porta is right; we Mainers learned a lesson in 2010. Here is what I learned:

• I will not support a candidate just because a party has anointed him or her.

• I will not support a candidate whose values, as demonstrated by his positions on important issues such as a woman’s right to choose and universal background checks on gun sales, are so different from mine, just because some party activist tells me to.

• I will not try to “game” the election so that my least favorite candidate doesn’t win.

• I will support and vote for the best candidate. I will work as hard as I can to make sure that my candidate wins. I will stuff envelopes. I will make calls. I will donate. I will make my voice heard.

Eliot Cutler is the best candidate, and I look forward to helping his campaign in the coming months and to voting for him in 2014. And, if all of us who think that Eliot is the best candidate pledge to stuff envelopes, make calls, donate and make our voices heard, Eliot will win.

Jesse Baines is a resident of South Thomaston.