Nevar Forget
1y 7mon ago by lemmy.world/u/homesweethomeMrL in politicalmemes
Stein wasn't even the only third party candidate stealing votes. I voted for Gary Johnson with the Libertarian party as a "protest vote". Glancing at national results, he had almost three times as many votes as Stein did.
I was 100% the moron this meme is targeted towards. I voted for Harris yesterday.
But you aren’t a moron if you learned from your mistakes. It means the opposite.
I wish we had ranked choice voting. Then these protest votes would still work and not screw with the system so bad and we could fight the stranglehold of the two party system.
I want something like this where I live. We have FPTP here, but we have a viable third option in some areas. I'd be happier to to have more than 2 robust parties on the national stage.
There were 6 or 7 candidates for President on the Virginia ballot. Would have been great to have RCV at the bare minimum here.
My state is trying to constitutionally ban the use of ranked choice systems 🫠 fingers crossed the muppets just drew enough awareness to implement it after we reject this amendment
Hey good on you for being open to change your stance. So many people these days cant.
I was that moron too in 2016.
Never again.
Thanks, bro. Legit appreciate it.
Me too Stein in 2016. I was so mad at Clinton for what they did to Sanders. I am voting Harris as soon as voting is open here.
Bernie deserved so much better, and I fucking hate the way the 2016 democrats fucked him over.
Don't forget 2020. They even made Warren stay in through super Tuesday just to fuck him over more. Not to mention thar snake trying to claim Sanders as a sexist with that hot mic. I never forgive her for that.
Same same man... Voting blue on Monday.
Third party voting; the really real reason Democrats and Republicans can't get their candidates elected. lol
The Jill Stein hate requires a lot of ignorance and very little faith in the candidate running at the head of the Democratic Party.
Obama crushed McCain and Romney, green party be damned. Biden squeaked by Trump on thinner margins than Trump beat Hilary. Nobody cared about Stein in that race.
What changed? Why are Democrats so terrified of the green party all of a sudden?
Because Biden just squeaked by Trump. Leading to 50%-ish of the US population and 80%-ish of Republican voters believing that the last election got stolen. Also leading to a lot of election officials in key states being replaced by fair election denying nutjobs.
Haven't you been paying attention in the past few years?
I'm not even in the US and I'm already exhausted with the BS that's upcoming, if there's no landslide victory for any of the candidates.
Be aware that any third party vote will be a vote for trump. If that's what you truly want, I fear for your sanity.
Btw, it's not true that nobody cared about Stein in the previous election. Back then they too said "a vote for Stein is a vote for trump". You may not have heard it personally, but that message was out there. And it's still true today!
I'm voting Jill. All your liberal gaslighting just hardens my resolve. I don't care how many convoluted explanations you come up with to say I'm voting for Trump. My ballot never said Trump and never will.
Correct, but your ballot helps Trump win nonetheless.
No, your refusal to field an actual popular candidate with actual progressive policies helps Trump win.
Homie, I do not control who the DNC fields. I am basing my strategy on the facts of the situation as they are presented to me. Where's your popular candidate?
Right, you only tirelessly shill for them by browbeating anyone that has a problem with their candidate currently overseeing a genocide.
No, just browbeating anyone who thinks the genocide wouldn't get worse under the worse candidate
Someone not even from the US understands this better than you?
Man… you have no excuses.
At this point it’s clear to me why you’re here and what you’re about.
My ballot never said Trump and never will.
When your vote comes with a free red hat, it kinda does.
And the Shill Stein love requires zero common sense, and a shit load of entitlement.
The only people insisting someone is entitled to your vote are shills working for the Ds and Rs
No one is insisting anyone is entitled to anyone’s vote. We are however insisting that you try and understand how voting statistics and simple grade-school math works.
Everyone else has this figured out already? Why are we so close to an election and you still don’t? Do you seriously think that you have some big hidden secret figured out? You know better than the overwhelming majority of an entire country?
Every generation does this shit. You think you know how it works. You don’t.
No one is insisting anyone is entitled
a shit load of entitlement.
:-/
Everyone else has this figured out already?
There arguments have been made. You simply don't like the conclusions other people have reached.
It’s amusing that you have the nerve to accuse others of being shills.
It's curious to see what touches your nerves
Solid burn there, guy. It made no sense at all but bravo for stringing the words together.
This, but since dot world is infested with Reddit liberals you're getting down voted into oblivion.
They’re getting downvoted into oblivion because everyone here knows better.
It’s always easy to be the most ignorant one in the the room if you ignore everyone that tries to tell you how and why you’re wrong.
a vote for stein is a vote for trump, both of which are a vote for poo-tin
Best Putin Pronunciation Award Goes To..
But I didn't want Clinton to win. My picks were: 1. Lessig, 2. Sanders, 3. Stein, 4. Johnson (Gary), 5. blank. Knowing only what I knew in 2016, I disliked Trump and Clinton equally, and would never have voted for either one.
(And yes, I did know that Sanders had endorsed Clinton.)
I would hope that you learned something from your error, but this comment shows clearly you haven't. I learned it when I voted for John Anderson and in my tiny way contributed to Reagan winning: in America, you vote to keep the worst fascist out of power, and if it means voting for someone who isn't perfect but has the numbers to do it, that's who you vote for. The primary may be your opportunity to show support for other parties, and you can go to rallies and spread the good word to influence the discussion, but until the day your third party candidate has enough potential votes to actually win it, you help hold the wall.
Shit, I wouldn't even discount trying to vote 3rd party when it comes to local elections or state elections. You have to chip away at the power the big parties have at the peripheries first, before trying to do big stuff like voting 3rd party in the big presidential election where they are basically guaranteed to not win.
Yeah but saying that you vote third party during local elections doesn’t rile people up. Many of these third party voters only come out of the woodwork during presidential elections just because they want to be contrarians.
John Anderson shoutout!
Man, Lemmy is awesome.
in my tiny way contributed to Reagan winning
Reagan won in a landslide
We wouldn't have a 6-3 conservative supreme court with Clinton, along with a rash of conservative lower courts. Not only have we had extreme fallout from this already. But it will be affecting us for decades.
A bunch of our red states likely wouldn't have swung to extremism, like my home state which went from Asa Hutchinson to Sarah Huckabee-Sanders. I don't know if my kids will legally be allowed to learn that slavery existed in school.
We would absolutely have a 6-3 conservative court with Clinton. We just wouldn't call it conservative.
We probably wouldn't have a fascist court like we do now though.
Also, the 2000 Presidential election results in Florida:
Ah yes, the true stolen election. But Al Gore conceded, even though it really was too close to call.
the electoral votes column juxtaposed with the other columns is just documenting what should be a crime.
Since all 'electoral votes' go to the winner in the US, why do they even bother mentioning it? Its seems entirely vestigial
US states have the option of choosing to distribute votes proportionally.
They even have the choice to let electors pick whatever they want
Oh my god what a tight race. I wonder what the closest vote in US history was.
My brother is voting for Jill Stein to "send a message to the Democrats" that they can't automatically rely on liberal votes. He voted for Nader in 2000 to "send a message to the Democrats" that they can't automatically rely on liberal votes. When I mention the 24-year gap here his response is "what's your point?"
I voted for Ralph Nader in 2000 and will never make that mistake again.
Not to worry, Nader hasn't been a candidate in a long time. Good luck out there!
That’s the official count, but we’ll never know what the actual count was. A bunch of people who “voted” for Nader were trying to vote for Gore but got screwed over by the format of the ballot.
Holy shit, 2,912,790 people voted for Dubya in Florida?! How come nobody noticed this before? I feel like that might have affected the outcome of the election.
I didn't actually realize the numbers were that high for her... Ffs.
They know what they're doing. The elections in swing states are always down to razor margins. The right spoiler is almost a guaranteed win for the opponent :/
Third parties help the democrats because the biggest third party is more right-aligned.
In Michigan Gary Johnson got 172,136 votes, in Pennsylvania he got 146,715, and in Wisconsin he got 106,674. If all Greens voted Clinton and all Libertarians voted Trump then New Mexico would've only been won by Clinton with around 1,000 votes, Colorado would've also been nearly Trump. Nevada, New Hampshire, and Minnesota would've been won by Trump. Maine might've gone majority Trump.
Third parties certainly know what effect they have. Their motivation is not to make the second party candidate win. Their motivation is to change the first party candidate.
According to Hotelling's Law, a two-party political system with FPTP voting results in candidates that are very similar. This is why the Democrats won't run real progressives for most offices, and why Sanders was forced out in 2016 with the excuse that he wasn't "electable" enough.
Third parties running for president aren't trying to win. They're trying to eat some of the votes on their side, thus pulling the main party candidates toward that third party candidate to reclaim those votes.
Third parties certainly know what effect they have.
Third party candidates that are running specifically in presidential elections and nothing else.
Third parties that actually want to move the needle participate in local elections, caucus with a major party for ballot access, etc. (WFP)
Their motivation is not to make the second party candidate win.
Bullshit.
Green's team literally stated the goal was for Kamala to lose.
Citation for that?
https://www.nj.com/politics/2024/10/harris-vs-trump-spoiler-says-the-quiet-part-out-loud.html
You can find others if you'd like to look, quite easily.
Edited to add the quote from Sawant:
We are not in a position to win the White House, but we do have a real opportunity to win something historic, we could deny Kamala Harris the state of Michigan. And the polls show that most likely Harris cannot win the election without Michigan.
Its pretty clear the goal there.
Jesus fucking christ. I'm so tired of the American political landscape
I have no idea why this is being downvoted. Thanks for the info.
See how that says "99.8% reporting"? If you look at the NYT, it shows the results after counting 100% of the votes, and it matches what's in the picture.
Fair enough, you are correct. Still bullshit to think that all of those voter would automatically go to clinton, but I will delete the bad information.
This should be top comment.
By your standard, your posts here should be removed for misinformation because your numbers don't include all of the election votes. Here are the final results of the 2016 elections by state, with citations. The numbers are consistent with the infographic.
Yeah, that's why I did that.
Thanks for the retraction. It was the honest thing to do.
It's incorrect. Look at the NYT. The difference is that Politico's numbers weren't updated after the final votes were counted.
/* in countries with a broken democracy
I voted for Harris yesterday, and I’ll be voting for Harris again tomorrow. Just kidding. Turns out the dead person whose identity I stole wasn’t registered to vote. 😞
You make jokes, but tomorrow this comment will be on FOX as proof them libs are cheating...
Well, they read it in a forum where anybody can write anything, so it must be true. They are truly the best at fair and balanced ripoartign.
I might risk voting 3rd party if this election wasn't a choice between boring corporatists and 100% concentrated evil.
The stakes are just too damn high to risk letting Trump get back into the White House again.
it's not worth it until first past the post is removed.
Until then it's mathematically impossible for a third party candidate to win. Focus your energy instead on removing first past the post, then you have a chance
The only time I went third party it wasn't to win. It was because I saw it as two main candudates so shirty that there was a good chance for third party to snag more voters than usual, possibly enough to gain slightly better recognition in the future.
The monkey's paw curled.
We got Trump. The recognition came as irrational blame for Trump.
I won't make the same mistake of voting for someone I think would do the best job. Now it's merely an effort to keep the worst viable candidate out.
You do understand that this is exactly what the democrats and the GOP want? Most importantly, what the people funding both parties want. If you'll vote for an unelected enabler of genocide just to keep another guy out you're showing them morals don't come into the equation for your vote.
What's stopping them from running a charismatic fascist vs an unlikable one?
Stop blaming voters for the democratic party repeatedly choosing the most conservative candidate and pretending they did it for "electability", only to end up in tight races.
What I want is to vote for someone I believe in. I don't get to have that in this current reality. So I opt to do the most good I can with what extremely little power I have. It doesn't matter what any other faction wants at that point. If the Republicans want my vote, they can stop presenting the greater evil.
Honesty is refreshing. I’m voting for Harris because I don’t want to see Trump’s orange face every week. Yes, I know what she is. Yes, I know what that makes me. I’ve made my peace with it. No, I don’t blame others who feel differently.
I've always critiqued the democrats but I'm so tired of trump. I will vote for a thousand boring democrats if it means removing these entitled, lying MAGA idiots from anything resembling power. They all belong in lunatic asylums, not in government.
This is the way.
The elections will always be between "boring corporatist and 100% concentrated evil". Every election feels like it's the most important one. You just gotta suck it up and vote third party regardless.
Except this time there is a literal fascist running. The third party argument doesn't work when we've got a candidate quoting Hitler and promising that this will be the last election you'll have to vote in.
There's always a literal fascist running, that's what the GOP is there for. Lately, there's two.
No, there isn't always a literal fascist running and to say that there is severely and dangerously downplays the threat that Donald Trump poses to both the US and the rest of the world. It's also a disgusting way to devalue the victims of fascism. A fascist is not simply someone you disagree with; they are not just an asshole, or a bad leader, or someone who leads their country into a war for their own gain. Fascists will erode your way of life, they will take whatever they want, they will take away your rights and spit in your face while doing so (assuming they don't simply have you arrested), they will kill you as soon as it either benefits them or if they just want to for the hell of it.
Use whatever perceived intellect and moral high ground you can trick yourself into believing you have to vote 3rd party, but just know that you are aiding in Trump's re-election. And all because you're too much of a dipshit to know the difference between an asshole and a fascist. Fuck you.
Lmao. Don't lecture me on what Donald Trump is gonna do to the rest of the world when it's been both parties robbing us in the global south. Many of Trump's most atrocious policies have just been happily accepted as the new normal by democrats. That's their function, one does the dirty work, the other pretends it has to stay this way now.
Any metric that doesn't include Joe Biden – the guy directly responsible for the mass incarceration of PoC via the 90s crime bill, a segregation advocate, a guy who has increased the number of children in cages in migrant camps, who keeps shipping weapons to a state in the middle of a completely broadcasted genocide – as a fascist, is a worthless, arbitrary metric.
You're telling me Bush, who greatly enhanced the ability of the NSA to spy on every single citizen in America, who had a torture camp in Guantanamo where they knew they were torturing innocent people, who had black sites in abu ghraib, who gave finance capital carte blanche to rob people with predatory mortgages and securities built on air, that guy isn't a fascist?
All this tells me is that the US has a far greater tolerance for fascism than anywhere else in the world as long as you don't use the word, and provided the fascists aren't targeting them specifically.
That doesn’t have to be the case. I’ve never felt that we had pure evil to battle until Trump was a candidate. Historically there’s been mostly two sets of policies and I prefer one or the other
Ranked choice voting eliminates the concept of spoiler candidates/parties.
If this were true then American politics really are terrible. Minority should hold seats. America needs to revisit representation.
It’s actually not entirely true, it only counts stein as the only 3rd party (the libertarian candidate in PA got 3x as many votes as her, I’d bet those 3rd party votes wouldn’t have gone to Clinton) AND doesn’t report factual numbers.
It’s just not true.
That said unfortunately voting for a 3rd party candidate is largely useless in the USA and the forces trying to get their opponents voters to vote 3rd party are probably more overwhelming then the forces actually compelling folks to vote 3rd party.
FPTP needs to die in the USA.
This is the way.
Support ranked choice voting
I don't understand why people make such a big deal out of these voters. Maybe I'm just consuming the wrong media, but it feels like third-party voters get 50x the blame nonvoters get for ruining elections with probably something like a thousandth of the population. I basically never see this discussion call out both third-party voters and nonvoters equally.
I keep seeing third-party voters maligned for thinking a candidate has hope to win a national election, I see so many arguments to address why third-party candidates can't win. In spite of that, I have never come across any community anywhere where people collectively believe these candidates actually have a chance. People who consume crazy media can believe crazy things, that's why MAGA is a thing, but there's a whole Fox News etc media machine feeding those people. Is there a forum somewhere with more than ten people where there's a consensus that a third-party candidate might actually win? None of the third party voters I have known or met irl believed this, and I would be shocked if they're all weird exceptions.
Like, please, where are these people congregating to spread the ludicrous idea that a third-party candidate can win a national election? Looking on the recent green party posts on their subreddits, the only thing I see even close is a thread with a headline about "candidates are electable if people vote for them", where the furthest they go in the comments is a few people talking about how big a deal it would be for the party if they got 5% nationally, and a couple other people replying to say the greens won't even get 1% this year but the election is still very important because of some nonsense about incremental gains.
It feels like we've imagined a brainwashing machine that does not exist in reality, rather than admit to the existence of protest votes. Condemning protest votes means condemning protest nonvotes equally, and we'll never have sufficient information about protest nonvoters to reasonably make a claim about how they would have voted. That would severely muddy any attempts to assign blame for election results.
If you're trying to convince these voters to act differently, the way to do that would be to address the arguments they're actually making, like the incremental gains nonsense. If you're addressing arguments they haven't been making at all, then it's worth asking whether you're trying to convince someone other than them.
America's system is a problem.
Yeah no shit. But 2 weeks from the election isn't the time to try to fix it.
Its the only time to fix it
What's your plan for getting a functional better system ready within two weeks? Because if you have an actually feasible suggestion, I nominate you for president.
Complain about it and get them to put it on their docket. Same as every other issue we care about.
The only way to have entrenched political parties adapt election laws is to vote for alternatives. Only at election time can the topic of election reform be addressed.
Ad 1) this voting system is fixed to keep the two entrenched parties in power. It is tailor-made to funnel power to the two behemoths so that they can amass power to a degree where other players overtaking them is... unlikely under regular circumstances. But apart from that, addressing the issue of the voting system and it being fixed are two different things, and just like one would not do car maintenance while the car is speeding along a highway, restructuring the voting process is not something that will feasibly be done two weeks before election day when certain states are already in the middle of voting.
Oh wait, you're serious. Let me laugh even harder.
People get weird close to the election.
People voting green party did so for a reason. Not everyone fits into perfectly shaped boxes for the 2 party system. Many vote 3rd party for leverage for policy change. The narrative of picking the lesser evil doesn't always apply to the narrative of the individual voter.
That makes an assumption that all or a big majority third party voters would prefer Harris over Trump.
Just for clarifying the logic here.
Yes. If Greens tend to the Left, the last thing they should want is right extremists
Nobody who would have otherwise voted for Trump is going to be convinced to vote for Stein. Every vote she gets IS one that was much more aligned with Harris.
This isn't a question of ALL third parties, but there aren't any right-aligned third parties making any kind of a meaningful run.
What??
In Michigan Gary Johnson got 172,136 votes, in Pennsylvania he got 146,715, and in Wisconsin he got 106,674. If all Greens voted Clinton and all Libertarians voted Trump then New Mexico would've only been won by Clinton with around 1,000 votes, Colorado would've also been nearly Trump. Nevada, New Hampshire, and Minnesota would've been won by Trump. Maine might've gone majority Trump.
Third parties hurt Trump more than they help him, because Libertarians would not have voted Clinton.
The Green Party is far more left-wing than the Libertarian Party is right-wing.
How does that contradict what I said. Also the LP is still further right than the GOP
If all third-party candidates had to vote for one of the two main candidates, I think nearly all of the Green Party votes would go to the Democrat, while the Libertarian votes would be much more of a split.
while the Libertarian votes would be much more of a split.
Maybe an 80/20 split at best, but the GOP has always been the more libertarian aligned party, going back to Barry Goldwater, Ron Paul, Rand Paul, and now Thomas Massie
They actually aren't further right anymore
I don't agree, but "right-wing" doesn't really have a non-arbitrary definition so it doesn't really matter
It's very convenient measuring ideological abstracts rather than the objective number of votes those parties got.
Vote for the candidate that aligns to your politics. If genocide and climate disaster is compatible with those, stick to the GOP or the Democrats.
And how many of them are running now? This isn't about them, this is about the one third party candidate that actually makes headlines.
Why do headlines matter if she gets way less votes than Libertarians?
The Green party gets more attention in left-leaning circles because there are people sympathetic to it and there are people who want to blame them for the Democrats losing. It's not because they're actually more popular than the Libertarian party, which regularly gets like 3 times as many votes.
2020: 1,865,917 (LP); 405,034 (GP)
2016: 4,489,359; 1,457,216
2012: 1,275,923; 469,627
2008: 523,713; 161,797
2004: 397,265; 119,859
So it's completely wrong to say that "there aren't any right-wing third parties making any kind of a meaningful run." It's just that your perception of how popular the Libertarian party is compared to the Greens is distorted.
At the same time, the way that the EC favors the GOP causes the spoiler effect of the Green Party to be amplified compared to Libertarians.
How? By the same math as OP, the Libertarian Party splitting the vote cost Trump Arizona, Georgia, and Wisconsin in 2020. That's 37 EC votes which would've been enough to make the election an exact tie.
So early voting has started in some states. Get out and vote people
A broken system gives you broken candidates.
Democrats who are actually concerned about Republicans should be pushing hard for ranked choice voting.
These memes make Democrats feel good, but only annoys third party voters.
I'm going to dress up as third party voting for Halloween
Don't you think clowns are a little overdone?
Well apparently they still scare irrational people.
These numbers are not correct according to NY Times
Edit: I can’t math
I double checked the subtraction with the NYT numbers you linked to, and the numbers look correct to me. Which numbers are wrong?
I can’t math and I think I looked at the wrong state for Michigan
I think maybe he means numbers themselves are wrong? I mean look at 7. That number is just all kinds of fucked up. Don't get me started on 23.
Most people that vote third party wouldn't vote otherwise. Assuming that every vote for Jill Stein would've gone to Hillary is quite the assumption. I always vote third party, so assuming my current vote for Jill Stein would've gone towards Harris instead is just dumb and wrong.
Sure when people think third party they usually mean “No, more fascist”
Is this the democracy Trump is threatening? One where you're berated for not doing the duty of voting for a candidate you hate and next time they'll get an even worse one? Where voting for the candidate you actually want is treated as sabotage?
The GOP gives their base the candidate they want, if the democrats don't, thats their own goddamn problem and those who vote blue no matter who should think about the responsibility they bear in making their own party the fascist lite option.
G.R.E.E.N.
GET
REPUBLICANS
ELECTED
EVERY
NOVEMBER
North America’s electoral systems are so broken. It’s painful to see so much negativity, frustration, and fear directed at third parties in general. If that same energy was directed towards building a ranked choice voting system with proportional representation, like single transferable voting (STV), the duopolies would crumble and we could all actually vote for whoever we want without having to worry we might end up with the worst candidate winning.
That's great. I Agree.
We got four more years to do that, if Trump doesn't win.
We've had tons of time to change voting systems.
All the third parties couldve banded together to get it done. Ya know. With all their existing seats of power in federal, state, and local government.
Oh wait.
Hint. Hint.
A third party would be worthless if it won federal office right now. It would be roadblocked every step of the way.
I agree that our voting system needs an overhaul. But don't try to do it by electing a third party president. It'll never work, and if it did, they would be falling flat on their face for four more years and paint a terrible picture for the future of all third parties.
A protest vote means absolutely nothing, except that it helps the least-aligned primary party power. You are bolstering your opponent to do so. Literally cutting off your nose to spite your face.
It doesn’t need to start with the federal level. There’s a growing amount of states that have already adopted some form of ranked choice voting and some of those have also adopted a proportional variant. Progress is being made in some places at lower levels, but it’s slow. Other states have banned it unfortunately.
So then what is to be gained by voting for Stein? A clean conscience about the atrocities abroad?
That's cool. Remember that when there are even more atrocities here against your brown and LGBTQ neighbors, while the atrocities abroad dial it up to 11.
Remember that when there's more middle-class homelessness because there's not enough contractors with all the deported. Or not enough food when there's no immigrant labor to tend to the fields. Certainly not enough domestic labor to keep the farms running along with everything else.
Assuming their original country takes them back. If not, they stay here as detainees. Now we are paying to host them in the prison system. But, at least since illegal immigration is a crime, they can essentially be near-free labor thanks to the 13th amendment. Is that the right way to fix the housing crisis? Or lower the costs of food?
Not saying we can't be world police. That position benefits us greatly and give us tons of soft power. But maybe we should worry about keeping our own house from caving in on itself before we start trying to fix someone else's.
Honestly the idea that a real estate tycoon who is addicted to Big Mac's could fix the housing and food markets is laughably absurd. He'll fix 'em alright...just not in the direction most of his supporters are expecting.
I’m Canadian. I can’t vote for Stein. Nor would I under your current system if I was able to. It’s tragic though that your federal system funnels your people into just 2 options.
Canada’s electoral systems are not much better but at least we have viable third party options up here that have been able to exert pressure and influence our governments and bring attention to important issues. It’s still first past the post, and that should change. Third parties can do good work in the right environment if you let them. We recently got the beginnings of a national pharmacare and dentalcare programs from our social democratic / democratic socialist / progressive party working with the liberals.
At lower levels of government, the US does have third parties other than the Greens that have been putting in work between presidential elections. Vermont’s Progressive Party and New York’s Working Families Party are worth checking out.
I don't know if you've noticed this about Stein voters, but they're very unlikely to switch their vote from Stein to Harris. If anything, there would suddenly be an unexplainable surge in write-in votes for Putin.
You fundamentally misunderstand the people you speak authoritatively about. Please remember that voters and supportive posters on the internet are not the same thing. I agree that Green Party voters (actual human citizens, not bots and trolls online) are woefully misguided but they are not trumpets by any stretch. Have you talked to any of them in person?
Ok champ. 👍
Idiots exist or the grifters wouldn't target them.
Dont let online bullies influence your vote. Each citizen gets one vote, cast it for whom you wish to support. Learn about the issues, the policies being proposed, and cast your vote for whomever you support.
Never forget that in 2016 13% of Trump voters voted for Obama in 2008/12. Maybe the Democratic Party can share some blame, instead of just shaming the voters.
Jill Stien only had 2% of the vote in 2016. That is nothing. Most of those people would have stayed home. The reason Hillary lost was because she was a bad canidiate who was unable to resonate with young voters.
Isn't Al Gore vs Bush an even better example?
If you ignore Katherine Harris and the Brooks Brothers Rioters shutting down the recount
Gore was slatted to win Florida until the SCOTUS ruled to end the recount and hand the election to Bush.
It is, however, interesting that the center folding and letting the right trample them is casually being present as the fault of the left. I sure hope it's not a preview of the next month or 48.
Meh - as I've been saying recently, it's clear the left (and I'm including anyone progressive and left of them) has no future now in either party. R destroyed themselves, Democrats are welcoming the rats who are finally willing to denounce Trump, and now we're going to have the conservative party ( D ) and the batshit crazy party ( R ).
Progressives and leftists can apparently go eat a bag of dicks now, and I expect to be dead of old age before we see any kind of momentum in that area again.
Can we get a nsfw tag? That twat's neckgina is making me sick.
Eugh thanks 😬
Every one so excited to back the lesser of two evils and wondering why things are the way they are
I'll never forget what third party voting gets us; additional fucking choices beyond the dominant two-party system, encouraging broader participation. When a Republican or Democrat candidate loses any race, it's common to see them use third party candidates as a scapegoat.
Except it doesn’t. Not in presidentials anyway.
Do you vote separately for your president in the US?
In Germany we vote for Parliament, whoever receives a majority of votes then gets the governmental mandate and their candidate becomes chancellor. Many people thought there never would be any other chancellor than from either the "social" democrats (SPD) or "christian" conservatives (CDU/CSU, also just called "Union"), until 2021 when the Green Party got so good in surveys we suddenly had three official candidates.
I do know about the "electorial college" nonsense, just asking what exactly the votes are aimed to be for, government or specifically the president.
In the United States we vote for people not party. Every ballot is different depending on the year and where you live.
This November I will vote for
- President/VP
- 1 of 2 US Senate seats (the other will be voted on in 2 years)
- My US House Representative
- My State House Representative
- A county board seat
- A city commissioner
- Retention of certain judges
- A school board seat
- A board member for our water district
If I choose to do so I could vote for multiple political parties across the ballot. Which is great because I might agree with my local green party of local issues but still want to vote for Democrats nationally.
I would really like to see us remove the electoral college, implement RCV or STAR. And move towards more of a proportional representation system.
Edit: Also worth mentioning that how elections are run also depends on where you live. States actually control how their citizens elect a President, I believe 2 are using RCV this year. Some states also allow local communities to choose how they elect local officials.
Primary Election, 1st Vote: One vote per voter to decide who represents the political party for the presidential election. Presidential Election, 2nd Vote: One vote per voter to decide who becomes the US President. The Electoral College and the stupid point system allows the minority vote to win. Yes, there are more names on the ballot for local government positions too. Technically, one could mix their votes with Democrat, Republican and other party candidates on the ballot.
I prefer the German voting system because it is based on the majority vote. FYI, I am allowed to vote in both Germany and USA.
Do you vote separately for your president in the US?
Yes, because they're the president not the prime minister(which is Speaker of the House in the US)
Hey, just because it hasn't happened yet doesn't mean it won't.
- a terrible gambler
Ahh the illusion of choice. You vote third party and get another Trump presidency, but hey at least you got your morals, eh?
If you understand that the Constitution specifies “most votes” win the presidency, and you understand the Slaver’s College, and you understand a third party doesn’t exist yet that can accomplish those things, so that you understand you’re deliberately throwing a vote against a demented fascist rapist away then - okay.
That’s unfortunate.
Maybe if everyone that posted threads like this voted 3rd party, maybe 3rd party would get enough votes for once to push a reelection and get on the radar? Instead of trying to get people to vote for 2 candidates that don't support their needs and/or wants.
You do realize that the winning president has to win at least 50% of the electoral college vote in order to win. If no one president does then the top 3 candidates go to the house of representatives to be chosen. Just the media if this happened would finally put a third party on the radar, even if they only won one state.
Me looking at the current state of our democracy and political system. 🤷
Electing a felon certainly can't make it worse. It is not like he is fantasizing about deploying the national guard against his own citizens.... https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/10/17/donald-trump-enemy-within-quote/75714201007/
Then maybe Kamala should stop glazing Israel's d. so much and actually do something to win back michigan muslims. They'll either vote third party or won't vote at all. The trumpists will vote Trump anyway. This post is purely delusional if you think you'll win some voting groups back just by dragging third party candidates through the mud. Especially voting groups so deeply involved in some issues that your beloved candidate clearly doesn't care about at all.
Jill Stein is a fascist bitch.
I remember 2020 where Trump did not win. All problems are fixed now.
Would you rather he did?
No more children in cag- uhh I mean no more war in the middle- ah fuck surely no more fracking at least??
over 130 million votes wasted in 2016. We are fucked.
Picture a situation where various political parties vie to unseat the Republicans. With more representative electoral systems, voters could select their preferred candidates, while still counting their vote against the Republican party even if their choice doesn’t win, all without the spoiler effect. Since voting methods are set at the state level, we don’t need to wait for federal reforms; some states have already enacted electoral changes. For instance, Alaska recently chose a more moderate conservative over Sarah Palin due to Ranked Choice voting.
Who would oppose having multiple opportunities to diminish Republican power? The Democratic Party would. In blue states, they could replace First Past The Post voting with a system that eliminates the spoiler effect. Yet, year after year, election after election, Democrats remain inactive on passing state level electoral reform in the states they control.
Republicans are moving to protect FPTP voting in red states. Why do the democrats want to use the voting system republicans prefer?
Its not that democrats dont know about the flaws in the voting system either. Just mention voting for a third party to any Democrat, and they’ll readily acknowledge the weaknesses of the voting system. Comments about the Green Party here will further illustrate their understanding of this issue.
If democrats understanding the problem, yet refuse to fix it, can only mean one thing. The Democrats prefer the country balancing over a fire pit of fascism rather than truly competing for our votes. They would rather this country be lost to authoritarianism then to play on a even playing field.
Party over country at all costs.
I agree with everything you've said except that the folks here upset at seeing third party votes help Trump win are NOT the same people refusing to fix the FPTP problem.
Maybe the Democratic party should consider what not following through on their campaign promises gets them. I don't how their failure to realize their promises to their voters is the fault of people voting for third parties
Don't mind me, just sweeping þrough to prune ð propoganda weeds on ðeir latest block/ban dodge accounts!
I mean, Trump supports the genocide too. If he were president, we'd probably have troops there helping out. I don't see how this is even a choice.
This is complete bullshit, and I'm glad the mod removed it.
The numbers in this image aren't real.
Also, why would you assume that those people voting for Stein would have preferred Clinton over Trump?
Those totals match the wikipedia article exactly, so if they’re wrong, please update them.
I assumed Stein voters were stupid and/or reckless but not evil. Perhaps you’re right though.
Why would someone who agrees with the Green Party platform prefer Republicans to Democrats? I'm sure such people exist, but I expect they're a tiny fraction of Green Party voters.
People who are normally socially and economically conservative (which may in part be due to far-right propaganda news outlets) but also differ in significant ways from mainstream western conservative politics, and they are much more opposed to the genocide than they are supportable of those socioeconomic values. Not so relevant in 2016, a lot more relevant right now. There's probably more of them than you think.
Sorry, to be clear, you're saying that potential Trump voters would vote for Stein to protest our relationship with Israel?
Not MAGA voters but possibly conservative Muslims who were influenced by Fox News and other far-right news outlets to think that Trump would be better for the economy.
This seems completely counterintuitive to me, but there's at least one poll indicating that Stein actually draws more support away from Trump than from Harris: https://www.newsweek.com/jill-stein-hurts-donald-trump-more-kamala-harris-poll-suggests-1970765
I ended up in a debate yesterday about who is more likely to win the election and looked into this more carefully, this article if I am reading it correctly is saying that Harris dropped 0 percentage points and Trump dropped 1 percentage points and assumed that the 1 percentage point was voters headed toward Stein, which seems very odd and clickbaity and I'm honestly disappointed this article was posted and taken seriously.
Right now Al Jazeera is saying that Arab American voters are tied 41 to 42 percent Harris and Trump respectively, compared to 59 percent Biden in 2020 and 17 percent Biden in 2023. Which would make me assume about 20% voting for Stein coming from previous Democrat voters making them a loud minority. I've also seen multiple anecdotes of Harris winning over Republican votes so it seems like that 1% drop in Trump support could be coming from that rather than people leaving Trump for Stein. So what I said earlier was probably BS it looks like (although I'm kind of surprised the Trump support is this high).
Evidence that third party votes would of voted otherwise? If people don't like any candidates, they might not vote at all
Or, they might vote Republican. In 2016, Clinton was na clear establishment candidate and Trump was a (fake) populist. Voters who went Green or Libertarian as a vote against the establishment were unlikely to swing to Hillary.
I'm not sure that dynamic still holds now. The MAGA faithful think Trump is a populist, but I don't think anyone else does.
Voting democrat or republican gets you a divided republic. The repercussions or their actions are about to reverberate through society. I fucking warned you.
If you don’t like stein, consider voting party for socialism and liberation instead.
They’re running Claudia de la Cruz on a platform of Palestinian statehood and an end to arms shipments to israel.
I found out recently that they’re on the ballot or have official write in status in 42 states, so unless you’re in Alaska, Nevada, Montana, South Dakota, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Georgia or Pennsylvania go for it!
E: forgot Nevada. They’re not officially recognized in Nevada.
I’d advise that no one buy into any of this nonsense. De la Cruz has a mathematically impossible chance to win, and at this point will serve only to siphon votes and spoil the election. Knowingly or not, this is what is happening.
Think about it: Ever wonder why you’re really only hearing about them recently? Where were they four years ago? What have they done to prove they will even do as they say? They have no track record to stand on, but for some reason, these people seem to think they can sneak into an election and have a chance to win on unproven, untested policy with no practical or effective way to make any of it happen?
Make no mistake- there is no good intention from anyone asking you to throw away your vote on these people this late in the game- NONE.
Were it a year or two ago, I could maybe see it. But weeks away from what might be the most important election of our lifetime- to even think to request people not do everything they can to stop a racist rapist traitor to America from forcing our own militarily against us, systematically removing the rights of our LGBTQ+ friends and family, and the rights of women to have body autonomy is as shamelessly in bad faith as one could possibly be.
DO NOT LISTEN TO THESE PEOPLE.
I might be misremembering the electoral values of the states here, but I think the combined value of the states they’re not official write ins or on ballot is only 64.
That leaves 474 electoral votes that psl could get, so they very much could win.
The history of the party is easy to find. They’ve been around for a little while now.
I’d choose a party with no track record over one with a consistent track record of genocidal violence and extrajudicial killings, but luckily psl has a track record of grassroots activism that’s pretty consistent, so I don’t have to take a gamble.
It’s a bit absurd to call opposition to genocide and apartheid unproven, untested policy.
I’m swiftly climbing the ladder of age and my whole life people have been saying “well, you should have been advocating for this or that last year, it’s too late now, this is the most important election of our lifetime!”
The best time to vote (and do groundwork for) psl was last year, the second best time is now!
I agree with the last part though, don’t listen to people peddling tired cliches and misinformation trying to manipulate you into voting one way or the other!
News flash genius…. Most everyone here is opposed to genocide. As has been said before, you’re not part of some fringe grassroots group that figured out that genocide was bad ahead of everyone else.
Stop with that shit. I don’t believe you’re here in any good faith to help anyone in any way.
If most everyone is opposed to genocide then I agree with them and want to help them find parties and candidates that oppose it too, like psl!
What party in opposition to genocide do you support?
I’m not going to stop politely and courteously advocating for the party and candidate I think is appropriate in threads where it’s on topic in a political comm.
It might not be a good idea to accuse people of bad faith when you open up with a sarcastic insult. World is pretty strict about that stuff, it’s like their number one rule.
America is a two party system.
I accused you of bad faith because that’s what I think you are. And I think the PSL is hot garbage and that’s why no one is taking them seriously.
Is there an argument I could make from my position that wouldn’t read as bad faith to you?
You’re here trying to garner support for the hopeless psl within weeks of an election, so….
No.
I was trying to garner support for the psl here months before the election too, and years before it in real life organizing.
Just for the sake of completeness, if you can’t see a persons position as having a good faith form, doesn’t that mean you’re the person here in bad faith? If you truly believed there was no earnest true believer doctrinaire communist that was committed to their party of choice because they really thought it was the best use of their and everyone else’s time, wouldn’t you just report me as misinformation or whatever and move on?
I’ve always considered bad faith to be not the person I disagree with but the person who isnt willing to engage with anything I’m saying, to assume that there’s a human being on the other side of the capacitive predictive text thumb pad and that they have reasons behind what they’re saying that are worth listening to.
Not when they’re actively trying to undermine an election.
It’s not clear from your comment, who is actively trying to undermine an election, me or the party for socialism and liberation?
If you support the PSL and are pushing people to waste their votes weeks before an election?
In my opinion? Both of you are.
De la Cruz should have stopped running months ago when it was determined to be mathematically impossible for her to win. That she continues to pull votes from the one person that CAN win is all anyone needs to know about the nature of her purpose.
And yours.
As I’ve said before many times, votes cast are not wasted. They are counted and have an effect even if the candidate loses.
Does the fact that the mathematical impossibility you referenced has been disproven change your assessment that de la Cruz should have dropped out? It would change mine…
Does it seem odd to you that instead of engaging with (or possibly even reading) anything I’ve said, you claim that all a person needs to know is that I and the psl take votes away from your preferred candidate (which is a statement I dispute)?
Do you think there is any place in our electoral system for third parties and their voters or should they all just abstain for fear of undermining the election?
Don’t complain if Trump wins.
I didn’t complain when trump won. I got out and organized. I was so active at that time I was even in government (albeit in a lowly local position). None of that stopped when Biden won and no matter what happens in November it’s not gonna stop.
Right… but somehow you believe that it will all stop if a do-nothing, ineffective, untested nobody like De la Cruz gets elected?
Yeah man. That is ALL anyone needs to know to determine your purpose here.
I’m done with you now. I feel disgusted just having this discussion.
I never said I would stop if de la Cruz wins. A de la Cruz win is part of the possibilities encompassed by the statement “no matter what happens in November”.
It really seems like you’re going out of your way to read my responses in the most negative light possible and just ignoring things I say that go against that reading.
LOL!
Not too disgusted to stop replying derisively without substance I see.
Do you realize that you started this exchange by throwing around accusations of bad faith and are now dismissing my replies to your questions and posting “lol”?
What’s up with that, was it a weird coincidence or what?
Hilarious!
Most everyone here is opposed to genocide.
Most everyone here is also voting for the Democrats, instead of agreeing to vote for a third party who is opposed to genocide
Are they running anyone in elections they might actually win? I might vote for a party like that for mayor or something. But I wouldn't even vote for them for state house representative unless they were well known enough in my state that they might actually win.
'Third' parties in this country can show themselves as serious if they try to establish themselves from the bottom up. If all they do is run for president and occasionally Senate or House, then they show themselves as unserious parties which are probably nothing more than attempts to siphon votes that might have gone to a real candidate.
Yes it's the fault of people who voted for a third party. Not the people who didn't vote. Not Trump. Not Clinton. It's the people who voted for a third party candidate.
The duopoly got us here. Third party or bust.
Always remember it's like fantasy football 🏈!
Yeah! I'm voting Harris! Yeah!
If she wins.... meaning that the actual electors from the unelected body called the electoral college, actually vote for her and she gets to win.... Then I would have picked the correct option! It's just like the Lotto! In election day you mark you Lotto ticket, then you wait for the election to be called..... meanwhile in the Lotto, they spin a wheel full of carefully balanced balls. They, the electoral college, pick the balls and show you the list of balls... Then you check your ticket and if you elected what they elected, then you won! You won! I can't believe it! I can't believe it because the electors can choose whoever they want! Yey! Democracy!
It's less fantasy football and more trying to prevent a genocidal dictator from taking power.
Yes but like this....think of a letter between A) and B)!
Pick A for Trump or B for Harris!
If you picked B! Guess what????? We'll let's wait and see what happens 😉. Hopeful they pick B to! I hope the people who do actually get to actually vote for our president, pick a good president to be our non king leader who we actually pick ..for realz.
In the meantime, I just got my ballot a few days ago in the mail and I'll vote B too. Hopefully I win too. But I'll have to wait until the electoral college picks our president too. Yey! Democracy!
Still not like fantasy football. Stupid, but nothing like fantasy football.
Okay, I give. It's not like fantasy football. I must confess, I got no clue what fantasy football is all about. But the subject is probably more complex than I care to spend and amount of time on at all.
I sure am excited about our new president though! I hope the electoral college picks the same one I picked! That would make me a winner! Democracy! Yey!
Cool. I just hope the electoral college picks the person who doesn't openly say that they're a dictator and won't start two genocides in the U.S., of brown and queer people.
I'd call that president a winner for those people. One of them is my daughter.
But sure, treat keeping millions of people out of concentration camps like it's trivial. I bet you don't feel the same way about Gaza.
Dude! We're gonna be rich 🤑!!!! That's the candidate I didn't pick! Imagine the possibilities if it's also the candidate the actual electors that actually not vote for president pick! Yes!
DEMOCRACY LIVES! 💪!!!
I was surprised at how many bozo candidates ended up on the ballot who no body ever talked about.
Almost like Clinton should have run a real campaign in MI😃. Stop running unpopular candidates and blaming it on greens. How embarassing lol.
It's possible more than one thing contributed to Clinton losing...
At any rate Harris is running a great campaign. So much so that every single potential voter is being considered, even the people that might be getting scammed into voting for Jill Stein. I don't think the Hilary's campaign even considered going after the people voting green because it was assumed those votes wouldn't be a significant factor. The Harris campaign isn't leaving any stone unturned. That means challenging people who are promoting third parties more.
Harris has declined in popularity with every day that passed after her coronation. She is running a mostly adequate campaign, and trying to please everyone has never been a seriously effective Democratic strategy, especially in the long term.
Harris has her strengths. Very few Democrats would have stood their ground as well as she did in the Fox ambush interview. That's where she really shines, when she can let out that inner prosecutor. Waltz was a great addition, but the campaign hid him away the second Harris took on most of Hillary's campaign advisors.
Just like Biden before her, Harris's greatest advantage is how much Trump is despised outside of his cult. Let's not be deifying her for that.
trying to please everyone has never been a seriously effective Democratic strategy, especially in the long term.
Do you think it would be more effective to piss off people? Maybe she could start telling us which voters she thinks are "deplorable"? Is that more effective than trying to please as many voters as possible?
The Dems have won three out of the last four elections. Not sure why you're saying this strategy is not effective given the one they lost was the one where their candidate called some voters deplorable.
Waltz was a great addition, but the campaign hid him away the second Harris took on most of Hillary’s campaign advisors.
The VP candidate is not supposed to overshadow the Presidential candidate. Walz has been on the campaign trail basically non-stop, and doing local interviews which may actually be more important than national interviews. The national media doesn't pick up on things Walz is doing all the time, but don't confuse that with the campaign hiding him away. Harris' debate performance and national interviews are much stronger than Walz's debate performance on the national stage. So why would they be trying to push a guy to do national interviews that he's not great at instead of doing rallies and local interviews which he is good at?
In 2008, Obama was the dark horse disruptor candidate. He ran on "hope and change", promising to be a disruptor. It was McCain who was the establishment candidate running the milquetoast campaign trying to please everyone.
Of course Obama was elected and immediately started acting like a standard establishment Democrats, fucking over Unions, letting bankers off the hook for breaking the economy, and rebuilding that economy on the backs of the working class. Romney was another milquetoast Republican like McCain, but this time Obama came really close to losing - despite some serious missteps by the Romney campaign. Running for the middle almost lost Obama a second term.
Hillary was, of course, as establishment and milquetoast as candidates come, and look who she lost to. Biden was almost as bad, but he did manage to squeak by with a win, but he beat Trump in swing states by a much smaller margin than Trump beat Hillary. This was with 4 years of Trump and a failed pandemic response still fresh in everyone's minds. Trump was far more responsible for losing that election than Biden was for winning it.
I'm certainly no fan of Hillary, but I think too much is made of the deplorable comment. She should never have made it but, once she did, the bigger mistake was trying to walk it back. That just made her look weak. There is absolutely a large deplorable contingent in Republican politics, and Republicans call Democrats far worse every day.
You can't run a "please everyone" campaign on real policy. Any actual stance on any issue will piss of someone. Democrats who run this way trade off grass roots enthusiasm in exchange for a chance at appealing to Republican voters. They don't lose a lot of Democratic votes directly, but it kneecaps the Democratic ground game. Campaign need volunteers to knock on doors and get people registered. Nobody is excited to volunteer their time for a Democrat that sounds like a Republican or promise to put Republicans in their cabinet. This is even more critical as Republicans step up voter suppression strategies.
I know that Waltz isn't supposed to be front and center, but he brought a lot of really effective strategies that were working great and got pulled by the Democratic consultants.
Yeah how dare ð dems pick ð candidate ð majority of ðeir primary voters picked! Ðey should have chosen someone more popular, like ð guy who got even less votes ðan her during ðose same primaries!
To convince Greens or Carlins (people who don't vote because the Democrats are still too evil from their point-of-view) to vote for Democrats, you need to understand yourself and them. Once you do that, you'll be able to offer more convincing arguments to support your position.
If you're voting for Democrats, you possibly agree with the following scale of evilness:
- 10 Hitler
- 9 Stalin
- 8.5 Trump
- 8 Republicans and people who vote for them
- 7
- 6
- ~5-3 elected Democratic party members
- 2
- 1 you
- 0 Jesus
The thing is that some Greens see the world very differently:
- 10 people making the biosphere unlivable thru overpopulation
- 9 factory farmers and commercial fishing companies
- 8
- 7 Hitler, Stalin
- 6
- 5 George W. Bush, Putin
- 4 Trump, Republicans, and people who vote for them
- 3 Gore, Obama, Democrats, and people who vote for them
- 2
- 1 Sanders
- 0
- -1
- -2
- -3
- -4 Green party
- -5
- -6
- -7 them
- -8
- -9
- -10
The Greens' (and Carlins') priorities are very different. They may think that choosing to make the biosphere unlivable is the worst thing you can do, because without a biosphere that supports life, nothing else matters.
As he campaigned for president in 2020, Joe Biden made a bold promise at a New Hampshire town hall, adding repetition for emphasis: “No more drilling on federal lands. Period. Period. Period. Period.” […] The Biden administration has now outpaced the Trump administration in approving permits for drilling on public lands, and the United States is producing more oil than any country ever has. […] The reality is the United States is already dominant. The country is expected to produce 13.2 million barrels of oil per day on average this year — millions of barrels more than Saudi Arabia or Russia. https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2024/08/16/biden-oil-drilling-production/
They may think that torturing trillions of fish to death every year, and enslaving hundreds of billions of animals in torturous conditions every year, is worse than all genocides and wars in all of history combined. They think that voting for someone who enables even a single genocide is a line they won't cross.
They may think that given the choice between popular Hitler, popular Stalin, and unpopular Gandhi; they'd rather vote for Gandhi than the popular lesser evil, because that specific evil is omnicidally evil. That it's better to vote for good and fail, than it is to vote for evil and succeed.
Yeah its hard for people to grasp that people have different values than them.
It's Jill Stein's fault the dems ran Hillary, it was all her master plan all along. She's also the one who did whatever the email shit was that people screamed about for 6 years. She must be stopped before she makes the administration do something crazy like supporting genocide
Stein can run AND you can be a dolt for voting for her AND we legally permit you to vote like a dingus, but (also legally) you go on a vote tally and we know how many dolts there were and we get to mock you as a small comeuppance for your ruination of everyone else’s attempt to improve our daily lives and those around us.
Not to suggest that we get to mock you specifically! Because we protect everyone in that way. SO FAR. But you’ll know who we’re mocking. Because we protect that, too.
SO FAR.
Hope that helps you make a better comment next time.
your ruination of everyone else’s attempt to improve our daily lives and those around us
The absolute anger at people who didn't vote for the shitty guy instead of those who did is goddamn sad. To blame third party voters at all for 2016 is heavy copium of some seriously pathetic levels
Hope that helps you make a better comment next time.
and so smugly full of themselves in a weirdly threatening way, because voting only counts if you vote exactly how they want you to
I disagree that it’s “goddamn sad” when people get mad about others refusing to mitigate harm through votes, and cause irreparable damage instead. Loads of people have been using votes as a way to mitigate harm for decades now. They don’t have the luxury to do otherwise. What makes you so special? Why are you above reproach?
I think it makes sense to be mad about that. It’s awful to see a chance to prevent harm and refuse to. I won’t pretend it’s okay just because you think you can chunk up my post to dunk on select blurbs from it.
I do think they can make a better effort in their posts. I think you can, too.
Move right to appeal to Republicans
They don't vote for you, lose anyway
Noooooo this is all Jill's fault.
Your username says Seattle but your political views are more rural Washington.
I live there- and trust me when I say, I get second-hand embarrassment on behalf of this city from reading their rhetoric . Seattle is a lovely and very politically literate city and in no way is represented by their… ideology.
I'm actually voting for Jill who might as well be a Lenin for how far right Harris is.
Don’t worry, I believe you.
https://www.nj.com/politics/2024/10/harris-vs-trump-spoiler-says-the-quiet-part-out-loud.html
We are not in a position to win the White House, but we do have a real opportunity to win something historic, we could deny Kamala Harris the state of Michigan. And the polls show that most likely Harris cannot win the election without Michigan.”
This proves that left leaning holdouts have real leverage. The Dems need us to win and if they want our votes they have to appeal to our values.
I guess...
Alternatively, left leaning holdouts for some reason really like to punch themselves and all their friends and family in the nuts and are a real wanker class.
Edit: At least 11 people are giant fuckin wankers
left leaning holdouts for some reason really like to punch themselves and all their friends and family in the nuts
My brother is voting for Jill Stein because Biden (and by association Harris) supposedly supports genocide - but he thinks Putin is a good person (and has recently started talking about how great China is) and waves his hand when I mention that Trump would support Netanyahu even more. Your "for some reason" resonates with me because I have no fucking idea what happened to my brother to make him start saying this kind of nonsense - except that I know he stopped reading books and now gets his news entirely from his Facebook feed.
Supporting genocide crosses a line for me that I am unwilling to compromise on. If that makes me a wanker I'll call myself a wanker proudly.
Trump is a clear supporter of the genocide. He wants Israel to destroy Palestine and he wants the US to do more to help them accomplish this. Harris is nowhere near as bad as this. She's not going to withdraw support for Israel, but she's at least going to try to rein them in and return to the pre-war status. Not great, but realistically the best that we can hope for with how supportive our politicians are of Israel in general.
These are the only two people that have a chance at the White House. If you don't want to support the genocide, don't waste your vote on somebody that is absolutely, without a doubt, going to lose. Instead, use it to vote for the one candidate that is possibly able to win over the person that is explicitly, unequivocally supportive of the genocide.
In my eyes, not voting for Harris is supporting the genocide. Anything that allows Trump into office is supporting the genocide.
So the only thing I can do if I want to end the genocide is to vote for the person currently doing the genocide?
The "democracy" isn't worth saving at this point
"My vote can't end the genocide immediately, so I might as well accelerate it"
What an asshole position.
You know, at first I was thinking that this is a really bad take. But then I realized something: this is a classic trolley problem.
Sparing the details because you probably already know them, it comes down to a choice: you can do nothing and five people will die, or you can actively perform an action and only one person will die. The only choice you have is to do nothing or do something.
So the problem becomes: which is the morally correct choice? On one hand, does doing nothing absolve you of the five deaths you could have avoided? On the other, does actively participating make you responsible for the one death even if it was to save five?
Back in the real world, you have the same choice. Since voting for a third party that has no chance of winning is functionally equivalent to not voting, it plays out the same way. You can do nothing and the genocide gets worse, or you can actively participate and try to reduce the damage. Which is the moral choice? Which will help you sleep at night?
That is a question philosophers have struggled with for centuries, and there's no good answer. From my personal perspective, doing nothing IS a choice, so no matter what I do I'm still an active participant. Therefore I will choose to minimize the damage.
Yes, it's bullshit that the current administration hasn't takes a tougher stance on the conflict. But it will be worse under Trump, as demonstrated by both his words and his actions when he was last in office. So the question is: which will help you sleep at night: doing nothing and telling yourself that you are not responsible when Trump wins, or doing something even though you know it won't be enough?
As powerless members of the masses, it's the best we can do.
Vote for a candidate who has demonstrated in front of my eyes that they will support disgusting mass annihilation of human life
Or
Vote for a candidate who it seems like would be worse on the issue somehow.
I'm accepting your framing but it's really hard to be more concerned about how hypothetically bad trump will be when Ive been seeing a lot of nonhypothetical horrific mass slaughter for 12 months and the "lesser evil" is regularly defending it on tv
Edit: to be clear I won't be voting for either genocidal candidate
https://newrepublic.com/post/187332/trump-biden-tough-netanyahu
When Trump says that Biden should not be holding Netanyahu back (regardless of whether or not he is) and that Netanyahu is doing a good job, then it can't be much more clear that Trump is going to enable even more.
I understand but that's still pitting trump's words (which aren't clear, he's never said anything specific about what he'd do) against the thousands of pounds of very real bombs that biden/harris have provided for mass slaughter. I believe you that there's a good chance trump will be worse but once again that's just speculation whereas I don't have to speculate about biden/harris I've been seeing the horror they create on tv for 12 months now.
Who do you think the US president is right now?
I'll consider believing there's a difference between Kamala and Joe when Kamala says there's a difference. Until then, you're just making up a reality in your mind where she is somehow better than him on this despite showing no indication of that.
That's extremely entitled of you. You're willing to throw away a flawed democracy to allow fascism to take over because you don't like either viable candidate? Absolutely childish. I guess the LGBTQ folk, minority folk, women, and everyone else who will suffer under Trump don't matter one bit to you, and ironically you'll accelerate the genocide in Gaza by letting Trump win.
You don't have a choice for "no genocide" because Israel has no intention of stopping. You can choose the one viable candidate who has a chance at lessening it, or you can choose the other candidate who has explicitly stated he will let Netanyahu do whatever he wants. Third party votes accomplish absolutely nothing for Gaza, and the Palestinians sure as hell won't thank you for it.
You’re willing to throw away a flawed democracy to allow fascism to take over
The only 2 viable candidates are both pro genocide
Fascism has already taken over and according to you there's nothing I can do about it
So the only thing I can do if I want to end the genocide is to vote for the person currently doing the genocide?
You either think Joe Biden is still running for re-election or you don't understand the powers of the vice president.
Got it. It's the latter.
The Green Party thanks Lemmy for all the publicity it has brought to the Jill Stein campaign
I love how entitled to peoples votes the democrats are.
Voting third party in a first past the post voting system ensures you get the candidate you want the least.
Third party is not a solution to a two party system but it does disproportionately affect democratic votes who want change and don't blindly vote. That's why it's often with Republican interests that these 3rd parties are funded in the first place.
Without third parties Republicans would win more
The opposite is true. It's not republicans splitting off to vote green lol When Trump won and when bush won, third parties took away significant votes (1-3%) away from democratic candidates.
In 2016:
In Michigan Gary Johnson got 172,136 votes, in Pennsylvania he got 146,715, and in Wisconsin he got 106,674. If all Greens voted Clinton and all Libertarians voted Trump then New Mexico would’ve only been won by Clinton with around 1,000 votes, Colorado would’ve also been nearly Trump. Nevada, New Hampshire, and Minnesota would’ve been won by Trump. Maine might’ve gone majority Trump.
In 2020 if Libertarians went Republican and Greens went Democrat, Trump would've won Georgia, Arizona, Wisconsin, and nearly Pennsylvania.
That would've tied the election, leading to a Trump presidency.
You're right about 2000 though.
"if they did that". Which they didnt, because third parties disproportionately affect democrats.
What are you basing that on? Again, Libertarians lean Republican, just as Greens lean Democrats, Libertarians cost Trump 2020...
Understandable. I'm not arguing about the technicalities of third parties in the first past voting system. You are 100% correct.
I just don't like the entitlement. I also don't like the green party cause I only hear about and of them once every 4 years for the elections. I'm simply stating how annoying and frustrating it is to see Democrats court more centrists and trad republicans than to their core base who they take for granted in a "who else you gonna vote for removed" kinda attitude.
Long term, its a solution to neither candidate supporting your values. It shows that you wont blindly support whoever is barely less bad. If your vote counts at all (which it pretty much doesbt) then you cant tell people not to vote for whoever is closest to their values. You should be telling the candidate to listen to their voters.
Long term plans that will fail if you let the system break before those plans have a chance come to light. You're trying to fine tune a system that's in danger of falling apart. We need to make sure the system doesn't fall apart before we can worry about tweaking it.
Candidates should listen to the voters, but we need to be realistic on how and when we can make moves. We need to look at the situation and see how we can best move the needle in the right direction. If you let evil men come into power as a result of your rigid morals than you are actually helping create what you hate most. You want the needle to move all the way to good, you won't take just %10 better, and as a result things may get much worse.
The road to hell is paved with the best intentions had never been more true.
Thank you for revealing what you are so I can block you
Block me as well blue conservative.
I don't take orders from pompous shitbags, good sir.
you dont feel they are?
No, they are showing how Trump, a person who never should be president, became the president. It shows that 3rd party voters can impact the outcome but choose not to. It doesn't have to be that way, you can make an impact.
They are not arguing in good faith
However, calling a person a (person who has an agenda) from (country that they are from) is against the rules
So just block them
Did I just get profiled for questioning the Democrats?
"Im going to be barely better than the alternative and people will literally worship me for it. Also even though i support killing children, trump would kill more probably. Vote blue!"
Disclaimer because lemmy users are becoming more like redditors everyday:
yes trump sucks. Yes vote kamala if youre in a swing state. No, dont attack every person who points out the massive flaws in your democratic system or the "democrat" party. Because they fucking suck also. Just slightly less.
"And we won't even support you federally and protect your rights .. Vote blue!!"
(Completely agree with your disclaimer)