Even though I'm a Libertarian in the strictest sense I find this both true and quite funny. DJT is just as bad or worse than Biden. DJT himself has stated that he went to St. James island [aka orgy island] TWICE. It's just like in sinning against GOD...the first look isn't sinning, but when you look the 2nd time then it's a sin. DJT is similar to a DON in a mafia, but he is just the DON of the deep state. The only way to stop Trump is to declare the 2020 election in his favor, HOWEVER since he voluntarily left the oath of office for the Biden admin DJT cannot be legally elected a 3rd term. He would be disqualified.
I voted for Gary Johnson because Hillary sounded awful in 2016 and I 1000x regret it. Fuck this system for making me choose between bad and worse, but yes obviously I have to choose bad over worse.
we'll all be doing this for the rest of our lives thanks to this system and it still leads us to the same place that the worse option does, but at a slower pace.
It doesn’t lead us to the same place but slower, at least not everywhere. One party has rolled back abortion protections, equal rights protections, bans books, and a host of other regressive policies. Democrats didn’t do that. Democrats might keep status quo, but the Republican agenda is literally to move us backwards to a worse place (though if they wanna move us back to when the highest marginal tax rate was 90% I could be onboard with that part at least).
And the Democrats are just watching that happen. Doing nothing to stop it. Now the Democrats are cheering the police on while they brutalize Pro Palestine protestors. The second they think they can jettison minority support they will. They've shown they're willing to support morally reprehensible actions. It's just circumstances that place them closer to minorities for now.
They are not in control of the House (which is in control of the purse strings) and "have" a razor thin "majority" in Senate (minus DINOs and plus veep).
And they don't have SCOTUS. And Trump had a record number of lower court appointments (because McConnel slowed a huge chunk down in Obama's final year, not just Garland).
So, are you suggesting that Biden act unilaterally? Because that is fascism. That's what we're trying to avoid here.
The funny thing is, Republicans would. They have no respect for the law and order that they claim to hold near and dear.
And that's what the election is, really. Fascism, or status quo.
Biden isn't the only hope. He's just a part of the only hope. Dems must not only hold the executive but also gain seats in both house and Senate.
Because here's the other thing (that nobody is talking about), and that's the Biden v Trump is only a very small part. One third of Senate, and all of the house, are up for vote this year. It's quite possible for either party to end up with a significant majority in either or both houses.
I would much, much prefer the current democratic party to be in control of two branches, than the current Republican party being in charge of two. All three? Fuck.
Ahhh the paradox of liberalism. We can't do anything for fear they'll do something in return!
I want them to grow some balls. I want them to withhold funding for federal programs being misused. I want them to arrest police officers and school officials on civil rights charges that are already on the books. I don't care if SCOTUS walks in and undoes it all. Every time they do that they add more weight to the reform SCOTUS position. I want them to look at bad police departments and tell them they can't get free military equipment. I want to see the modern equivalent of the 101st escorting a black student to school.
This idea that we can't engage until we have everything lined up perfectly is just an excuse to do nothing and watch trans kids get killed. But it's okay, we voted for the blue guy!
That’s not true at all. Biden specifically has protected more public spaces and land, while Trump specifically attempted to lease / sell / make available more of it to corporate interests. Net neutrality is being restored after it was rolled back under Ajit Pai. We can be frustrated democrats don’t do enough, or aren’t further left, but to say they keep the status quo at the regressive place republicans want to take us is demonstrably wrong. So while maybe they won’t expand affordable care beyond where it currently is, they’ll at least keep it where it is and restore it if possible. If they won’t add new parks, they at least protect the ones we have and cancel corporate interest on existing ones. If they won’t raise the taxes heavily on the rich (which is where I think they’re most guilty of “status quo”), they at least won’t give them trillions in tax breaks like Trump did.
That’s not true at all. Biden specifically has protected more public spaces and land, while Trump specifically attempted to lease / sell / make available more of it to corporate interests.
Net neutrality is being restored after it was rolled back under Ajit Pai.
I'll consider it an accomplishment when you can speak of it in the past tense.
We can be frustrated democrats don’t do enough, or aren’t further left, but to say they keep the status quo at the regressive place republicans want to take us is demonstrably wrong.
I live near the Texas/Mexico border. Democrats just recently adopted what is essentially Republican policy regarding border security. Republicans did the predictable thing and moved to the right, and now Republicans' previous position is Democrats' reasonable moderate stance.
When Trump said that he wasn't going to support a nationwide abortion ban and instead let the states decide, Democrats said he was just pretending to be moderate on the issue. And suddenly the patchwork of abortion bans is the moderate position.
Note that repeals of policies means someone had to have passed it originally. Guess who passed net neutrality originally? Guess who passed the clean water rule? Guess who passed affordable care act? Oh, it seems democrats actually do move us left.
I also live in Texas, a state controlled by Republican interests for the past 20 years. Let’s look instead at locations where a state flipped blue. Just by one example, Michigan then passed a statewide constitutional amendment protecting abortion. You may be upset that we have to get statewide protections passed, but we only have to do that because Republican judges went against some 50 odd years of precedent to force it. So democrats are actually enshrining the very thing that Republicans took away.
Look, you can troll all day and pretend that Democrats are just as bad as republicans, but that’s absolutely wrong on so many issues, and frankly I’m going to exercise my right to vote for the party that will protect the things I want protected and move us further left.
Like logically, you should vote for the furthest left candidate that can actually win the election at every level. Anything less than that and you’re contributing to moving the country to the right. Reap what you sow and what not…
That wasn’t my immediate assumption. That was a conclusion drawn after you repeatedly stated that democrats were moving right and basically did nothing good. Which is fine, and I probably shouldn’t have assumed how you would vote, though given the environment these days it wasn’t too audacious of an assumption.
By all means critique. But also please vote for the furthest left candidate that can win in every election you can vote in. Especially in Texas. This place needs so much damn help, and the Republican leadership definitely isn’t going to help (unless you’re ridiculously wealthy or own a large company). And get others to vote as well, because the only thing that will change Texas is to change the elected officials in charge.
By all means critique. But also please vote for the furthest left candidate that can win in every election you can vote in.
Already do. Unfortunately, my party does shit like pull the funding from progressive candidates to make sure they can't win (Michelle Vallejo), so I only get to vote for centrists.
Absolutely. But if we can flip Texas from right and alt right to centrist then we may actually get progressive candidates in other areas (and frankly, if we flip Texas blue we will see a shift in policies from republicans to the left). And, perhaps by some miracle, we can get star or ranked choice voting, but that absolutely won’t happen while republicans are in control here.
Here’s to a better Texas (lifts shiner [but prefers one of the many smaller microbrews here])
Absolutely. But if we can flip Texas from right and alt right to centrist then we may actually get progressive candidates in other areas
We'll get as far as centrist and then the party will protect incumbents like Henry Cuellar. (Notice that they're not protecting Bowman because he's a progressive.)
Here’s to a better Texas (lifts shiner [but prefers one of the many smaller microbrews here]
If you ever find yourself in the Rio Grande Valley, I'd recommend the Padre Island Brewing Co.
I see it as damage control while these grassroots attempts at major system changes take hold. We're holding off the assault while we wait for the calvary to come, but they are coming. We just have to not blow their chance.
Yeah but I'm mad Max and even though I make no effort to better anything now, if everything falls apart I'm going to all of a sudden have motivation and rise to the top, because this is my story and I'm the main character!
Or what you can do is what you're supposed to do: work from the ground up. Presidential vote is not the place to drastically change things. As long as we have fptp, the vote for president is always going to have to be a strategic "vote for the candidate that sucks less."
Face the facts, if everything falls apart you're not going to end up on top of you're on the bottom now. It's just going to be even more shitty for you, and you'll then end up in another shitty system.
The idea is to implement the change locally and work up. That takes time and effort tho. If you want the system to work better, vote strategically federally and then work locally to get the people you want elected.
Hillary won the popular vote in 2016 by a nearly 3 million vote margin, I don't think you need to feel any regret over your one vote going to someone else you actually wanted to vote for.
Also, even if she'd lost the popular vote too, it ain't the voters fault that the DNC keeps deliberately sabotaging the good candidates in their primaries to give us turds.
I appreciate the sentiment but I think my regret is more tied to the fact that I very much fell for the white supremacist men’s rights activism and homophobic rhetoric of the time, and me voting for Gary Johnson over Hillary feels like a symptom of that fact as well, and I deeply regret falling for that bullshit.
Like it or not, Clinton destroyed sanders. The DNC definitely showed a bias for her, but by no stretch of the imagination was he sabotaged. This narrative is the same BS that trump supporters spew that the media was unfair to trump which is part of the reason he lost.
The reality is that sanders just doesn't (unfortunately) represent the average Democrat. People like Clinton and Biden do.
That's kind of a circular logic though; the DNC alienates voters who don't like their blessed candidates. If they didn't do that, and more leftist candidates like Sanders were welcomed, then the "average Democrat" might look a bit different.
You know there are other offices than president right?
You want a further left president, you're going to need to show that a lot of people want a further left president, by having a lot of further left politicians in state and local offices.
You don't just jump right to the Whitehouse. The presidents politics are a reflection of the politics of the whole party, not the other way around. IDK if you watched the GOP primary debates in 2016, but it was very much an "everybody sucks here" kind of event. Each candidate might have been a little more reasonable on one of two smaller issues, but all in all they were much the same. The only thing different Trump had was charisma and campaign stamina.
No reason you can't vote for more progressive candidates for presidential primaries, but there's no sense in holding such a grudge when the party outlier loses. It's kinda obvious from the get-go that that's going to happen. And that's fine. There's nothing wrong with voting for a loser, and a popular loser can easily land a cabinet position where they could still have a very significant voice.
You know there are other offices than president right?
You want a further left president, you’re going to need to show that a lot of people want a further left president, by having a lot of further left politicians in state and local offices.
I've seen the Democratic Party put its thumb on the scale for centrists at the congressional level: Henry Cuellar. I've seen them pull the rug out from under progressives who manage to win the primary, also at the congressional level: Michelle Vallejo.
Progressives cannot do as you describe when the party shuts them out at the lower levels as well.
There's actual evidence of sabotage tho, such as Hillary getting early access to debate questions, Shadow company (not even kidding they actually fucking named themselves that, look it up) being run by DNC members being in charge of tabulating voting in some states, and more.
They were even taken to court for it and admitted to some wrong doing, but nothing could be done since apparently the DNC is a private entity and no laws are broken. Legally they can screw over any candidate they want.
Fuck this system for making me choose between bad and worse
Don't make me defend the US voting system but that is not how it works. Primaries exist and that's where voters make the case for a specific person. The large, general, national elections are for forming coalitions and compromising. This is what we do to decide who gets power instead of physically fighting. There will never, ever be a time when a single candidate is the ideal choice for a majority of Americans. Compromise is a core tenant of democracy and by definition it means nobody gets everything they want.
And while we're on the topic, 99% of leftists understand this. Anyone telling you "voting doesn't matter" or that "both candidates are the same" is just trying to reverse the progress that's already been made.
Most of what you said is spot on but you originally quoted about choosing between bad and worse.
I get what you're saying about the primary system, but even that is broken. Incumbents are almost never primaried. Typically the party will not allow it. There also needs to be consideration of what primarying an incumbent could mean. It's unlikely any of the challengers would win and in the process they would burn through campaign money and highlight weaknesses in the winner's record and character that could be used by the opposing party.
We do have a primary, but it may not always give the best candidate. If argue only a portion of people who vote in a general even vote in the primary.
Could just also mean you live in a non swing state and want to give a 3rd party a shot at getting over 5% of the vote so they can get federal funding and be a more serious option in the next election. 🙂
Do it in the primary.. where the current system expects it.. but.. there is only 1 or 2 primary candidates in the current style winner takes all scenario we have.. and ID say fight for instant runoff elections, but vote for those with a chance until then.. Even if you think your state is safe..
You don't know whose gonna show up and whose gonna stay home. Plenty of states were lost in 2016 just out of apathy. Enough states were lost in 2000 because Nader cared more about the environment.
Here's the thing. Suppose a progressive third-party candidate actually gets 5% of a popular vote. Well, there's only 100% to go around. So, a progressive third-party candidate would be likely be taking from the more-left first-party candidate.
So let's look at 2020. Biden had 51.3% of the popular vote, Trump had 46.9. So take 5 from Biden and that puts him at...46.3.
That's fine...after all we learned that the electoral college is all that really matters, right? Except two out of the last three presidential elections that Republicans won, they lost the popular vote, but because the EC favors their states, the won the election.
It. Is. Not. Worth. The. Risk.
The only way that it works (at least under FPTP rules) is if a comfortable majority of the country is already leaning in the direction of your third party, enough so that even with the 5%, the more closely aligned party still wins by a comfortable margin. We are not in such a position. Voting for a third party in the current conditions in the hope that they'll get to that magical 5 is, most certainly, shooting yourself in the foot.
Honestly the more you think about it, the more it seems like that 5% number is spoiler-candidate bait for the unaligned party to use at their advantage, to make voters feel like they are doing a good and noble thing, when they really are just cutting off their nose to spite their face.
Yeah no one takes orders from you take it down a notch kiddo. 😜
No reasonable person would predict my state would turn in this election. Even our Republican politicians hate trump here 🤣. Trump won't win my state. I would wager as much money as I could on it lol. Trying to dictate what I do with my vote based off this improbability is silly.
Don't be so laissez-faire with your words. You could easily be astroshitting all over the place. Somebody in Michigan or Pennsylvania or Florida or Arizona could think that voting for a third party will give them the warm/fuzzies too.
Astroshitting? Are you accusing me of being paid to do this? Dude I just made a comment with another reason someone wouldn't vote for Biden.
'Don't be so laissez-faire with your words. You could easily be astroshitting all over the place.'
My original comment used the words "non-swing state" now you're saying "oh well, I didn't know when you said non-swing state I thought maybe it could be a swing state." You're silly. You also edited your last comment after I responded to it, which is gross.
I won't be wasting my time with responding to you after this 👈😎
I'm not going to tell anybody what to do or who to vote for but one of two things are very likely to happen at the end of this election:
Biden is re-elected. We continue with the status quo. We have a chance to make small incremental steps toward a better future.
Trump is elected. Two Supreme Court justices retire and Trump appoints two more. At that point he will have appointed FIVE of NINE Supreme Court justices. We have already seen what they're willing to do. Imagine what they will do in the literal decades to come.
Choose what you want to do, but take responsibility for your choice. Vote in your local elections. Big changes can happen from the ground up.
It's the federal judge appointments that matter and almost nothing else. Most of what he does can be undone except for that.. It would cause a generation of damage.
Sorry, you will get big changes voting for Trump. becasue too much is already in place to make those types of changes happen. I dont agree with these changes, but to say they are the "same" is a dangerous opinion.
The person at the top is needed to green light policy.. those lower down present such policy.. While this can seem boring it is important, since while by definition the president will be at the center of their party. If the party you vote for is most interested in vetoing everything of the other party.. even if they agree with the law in general, there is no progress.
Of course you must do more than just vote for the least bad president to make the change happen.. However if you can't at least do that you own the results os the OP said.
"But take responsibility for your choices"strikes me as hilarious. Voting is not public. In a democracy with private polling,hardly anybody takes responsibility for their choices. Actually, zero percent. That is why the elected president is never popular for like the first year in office. Wouldn't it be lovely if people assumed their responsibility for making choices, though? I would be on speaking terms with so many people from my past if they actually learned from their own stupidity.
The thing the libs/"moderates"/"centrists" don't seem to understand is that this vote has long been stollen from leftists by the DNC when they decided not to run a Democratic Primary.
So for lefties it's a "choose between Charles Mason and Jack The Ripper" vote: a false choice.
The only real choice for lefties in this vote is explained by Game Theory:
Basically what you have here is a situation with entity A and entity B, that happens in rounds. Entity A chooses how to share something between A and B get, entity B decides to "accept" - in which case they both get their shares as decided by A - or "reject" in which case none of them gets anything.
In simplified terms, Entity A is the DNC, Entity B are lefties, including those in the Democrat Party, rounds are the elections and what's being approprotioned is how much a presidential candidate represents each side.
What Game Theory tells us in this case, actually backed by scientific experiments carried out with actual humans, is that if Entity A divides things in a very selfish way and Entity B "accepts" rather than choose "reject", i.e. does not punish Entity A for it even at the cost of a small loss for itself, then in the next round Entity A will divide things in a just as bad or worse way for B.
It never happens that Entity A, being one that divides the cake in a very selfish way, becomes less selfish in that division after a round were Entity B chose to "accept" that division. The best you can merelly hope for as Entity B if you keep on "accepting" is that Entity A doesn't become even more selfish in the next round.
Applied to this very specific situation it means that as long as the lefties keep on accepting the choices of the DNC (who are liberals, backed by campaign contributions from very wealthy people) for who the Democrat Presidential Candidate represents the most, then for each subsequent election the choices of the DNC will be worse and worse for the lefties.
If you look at the rounds of this "game" so far - each round being an election - this is exactly what has been happenning: the only time the Democrat candidate is ever a little leftwards from the previous one is after after their votes from the left fall, which is generally when the Democrat Party loses an election.
So the correct choice for anybody on the left who wants a chance to elect a President that is more representative of their views, and that only in a future election (as the present is already lost since the DNC has already made its choice), is to "punish" by not voting (or, even better, voting a third party candidate if they find a suitable one), which does mean the DNC loses its big bet on a guy that pretty much only represents Liberals and even Zionists, even if leftis too will lose whatever tiny bit of "representation" they would get with the not-quite-as-extreme-right presidential candidate chosen by the DNC.
Do not "punish" and instead "accept" (by voting Biden) and the next round of the game (i.e. the next election) will be the same or worse.
This argument implies that Biden is left of Obama. It also ignores the very real risk that by not voting for Biden in this round there will be no fair future rounds to participate in. It also ignores all other elections and chances to influence the party.
Trump is a uniquely different candidate than McCain, Romney, Bush, whoever you want to pick. He tried to interrupt the peaceful transfer of power and there is little reason to think he would not try again if given the chance.
Real life is not so simple as game theory and attempting these simplifications is not as rational as you imply.
Please vote in the coming election for Biden. The consequences of "Punishing" the Dnc are too dire to ignore.
"The only time that something" is the logical "might something" not the logical "must something"
Also you weren't like me right smack in the middle of the Finance Industry keenly observing what Obama (amongst others such as Cammeron in Britain and Merkel in Germany) did in the aftermath of the 2008 Crash and how they did it, or were living under a rock when the suppression of Occupy Wall Street happenned, if you think Obama is in any way form of shape leftwing, center-left or even center-right: you need to go way back, before Bill "I repealed the Glass-Steagal Act so that Finance can do whatevere the fuck it wants and thus caused the 2008 Crash" Clinton to find a Democrat with even the mildest touch of merelly center-left thinking.
"We'll not-vote and then they'll give us what they want!" has worked out sooo well in the past. Eight years of W. Four years of The Idiot. Are you happier now, having lived under those disasters? Is the DNC more in-line with what you wanted, compared to Gore and Hillary?
Like a real president should, Biden does a lot of things I agree with and some I don’t. I thought Obama was one of the greatest presidents in my lifetime but even he did things I didn’t completely agree with. Would I’d rather have someone like Bernie or AOC in the Oval Office? Absolutely (well except he’s to old and she’s to young). Could we do better than Biden? Also absolutely. What I’d love to see is national ranked choice voting and more like 5-6 candidates. I think this would be better for everyone. But Trump is an existential crisis waiting to happen. I’m not sure this country can withstand another Trump presidency. Frankly I’m not sure my health can either. I literally noticed a significant drop in my BP when Trump left.
So yeah, you can be critical of Biden and not a Trump supporter. Frankly if you’re not a little critical of any president regardless of party, you’re not in a party, you’re in a cult.
Speaking of a different BP, I don't think that humanity could survive another Trump presidency. That BP being British Petroleum.
Shitty segway I know.
But part of Project 2025 is to roll back climate regulations, invest solely into fossil fuels, and hamstring the EPA. So, you know, as much as we complain that not enough is being done...that's the alternative.
I think Biden has a really tough job at this campaign.
He's not going to sway any Trump voters. He's going to have to get people in key states to actually show up at the polls and vote for him.
Several of those key states care a lot about
fossil fuels. States whose biggest industry is coal, or oil, or cars, or steel.
So harking a lot on climate policy won't sway them much, and directly attacking Trump's policy will just enrage Trump's base and potentially cost him really important states.
He has to break apathy while also not fanning Trump's flames too much. I think that's an incredibly delicate balance for this one issue, let alone everything else. It's like trying to tell Bruce Banner you ran over his dog. It's the right thing to do, but you're still going to regret it.
I never liked Biden since the Obama years and I now hate him quite a bit. Sadly voting for him at this point is simply necessary, because if I am not in a good enough state to survive then I cannot support the Palestinians nor Ukrainians.
I don't get this attitude. Obama was literally against gay marriage. Biden's policies have been so much more progressive than Obama's and yet nobody I know likes him more. I'm not a "fan" of Biden but that's because it's weird and creepy to be a "fan" of government officials. He does a lot I don't like but if you literally hate Biden I don't forsee any president ever meeting your criteria.
The vote I cast in 2020 was against trump and not for Biden. I feel pretty good about that decision considering what happened afterwards. I'll vote against Trump again as many times as it takes.
This particular vote is an "A\B" question. No matter what you do A or B will be chosen. All other "choices" will be ignored and will have 0 effect on the outcome. The only thing that matters in this vote is who wins.
Not voting at all, or even voting for C, both have the exact same results as voting for whoever wins.
So if you choose not to vote, and Trump wins, then you created the same results as if you had voted for Trump.
If you wanted to vote against Biden but did not want to vote for Trump then you should have voted in the primaries to defeat Trump before he was the only alternative to Biden. In fact, of you had blocked Trump from being nominated again, Israel would not be doing what they are doing. Israel actively wants Trump in power, so that is why they are doing this now.
Yeah this isn't even like a complicated idea; I don't get why people have trouble with it.
As a practical real world example: in the 2000 election, Bush won Florida by 537 votes. (the exact number is questionable because of the recount and the bullshit that was Bush v. Gore. Which we can and should be very angry about but also doesn't change the conclusion here).
97,488 Floridians voted for Ralph Nader.
Now, I'm gonna assume that people who voted green care about like. The environment. And I'm quite sure that Nader was more progressive on environmental issues than Gore was -- Gore would probably have been a boring and relatively centrist democrat. But by voting for Nader over Gore we didn't get Nader, we got Bush.
If even 1% of the green voters in Florida had held their noses and voted for the candidate who they maybe didn't align quite as well with but had an actual shot at winning, we could have had a president who actually recognized climate change as a threat almost a fucking decade before we did,instead of a climate change denier. Would it have fixed everything? No! But we'd be a hell of a lot better off than we are now.
Exactly. This is what I cannot understand from all these "true hyper-leftist" people. You do realize that the future of the USA is at stake here, and that our system is fundamentally rigged to not allow any real alternative as a choice, right? Your brain-dead "BIDEN BAD VOTE THIRD PARTY" is just going to enable Trump and then you'll never be able to vote for anyone ever again as you are forced to participate in alt-right Trump rallies every single day and post on the Trumpernet about how much you love Trump. This isn't much of an exaggeration -- this where they want to go if Trump wins.
You're not supporting Biden. This isn't how our vote works. You're voting for the person less likely to fundamentally fuck our country up. And in case you still don't quite understand who this is, that is Biden.
Nah, everyone is free to hate. However, support from others on this planet against Trump is also important. To some degree we all affect one another and his rise into the seat again would directly impact a LOT of people, even outside the U.S.
BUT
I'm hoping that there is now enough anger and frustration for us to carry the momentum past the voting gates and straight into very strong pressure towards all politicians. This IS fixable. The message is there, even if it will result in violence from our militarized police force.
This is ignorant fear mongering. If thats the way the system works as you say? Then its our duty as citizens to destroy the system entirely. If thats America then this is not a democracy and its certainly not a democracy worthy of being preserved. IF that is the system you claim Joe biden stands to preserve? Then we SHOULD let trump come in and tear the whole thing down.
I think trump is a fundamentally morally detestable character. Butt iv lived thru 1 trump presidency. Hes backwards, hes an ass. Hes not a good leader. But hes not the end of everything as we know it. And I'm not giving more power to a corrupt party of beaurocrats who continue to lie to my fucking face while selling me out to corporate interests behind my back and completely hollowing out our countries economic capability all the while refusing to make good on any of their promises and funneling all my tax money to foreign wars while we bleed for healthcare. Fuck this countries "democracy" the fact you even believe we live in a democracy is hilarious. Congress has a 14% approval rating. Our representatives do not represent the will of the america people. They represent the will of their largest financial donors.
I get what you're saying, but I'm trying to parse what is actual "things that can / will happen under a Trump presidency" vs "what the democrats and liberal media want us to think can / will happen under a Trump presidency". I'm likely voting Biden simply because I saw what a shitshow the Supreme Court became (and will be for quite some time) under a Trump presidency. But I also notice Biden did fuck all about it so part of me wonders if the democrats are doing nothing for the simple fact that they have a fearmongering device setting the up for the next election. I mean, honestly the state of politics in the US is just pathetic.
I feel the frustration, and agree with it. But the choice you’re describing does not exist. The options aren’t “fucked up status quo” with Biden and “start over fresh” with Trump, though. The options are “fucked up status quo” with Biden and “way fucking worse corporatism, inequality, treatment of any marginalized/minority group, personal freedoms, bodily autonomy, religious liberty, foreign relations, healthcare, education, environment… oh and let’s just completely give up the little voice we have” with Trump.
All the stuff that pisses you off about the corrupt bureaucrats in the Democratic Party exists across the board in the Republican Party, but worse.
I could see somebody voting for Trump hoping that the world ends more quickly and rebuilds so that their great-grandkids, if they exist/survive, might live in a better system. But the price for placing that unlocke unlikely bet is to fuck up the system now and in the near future, negatively affecting tens of millions to billions of actual people.
Ignorant? Look up Project 2025. Then tell me I'm exaggerating. You are either laughably ignorant about our situation, or you're a Trumper trying to convince people that everything will be fine when it will absolutely not be.
Vote blue in 2024, then push better agendas and vote true left next time. Because I can guarantee you if Trump wins, you won't be voting any more.
The largest current of leftists aren't saying you cannot vote for Biden, and that you should vote third party, but that ultimately change comes from outside the electoral system.
Unfortunately unless a revolution falls into our laps and magically solves all our problems, the modicum of control we have over the steering of this ship is limited to voting and advocating for others to vote
They’ll never accept that, because they fundamentally see nothing wrong with the system. They want to preserve the broken machine, even if it doesn’t work for them. They think changing the oil will repair it, when it was designed to break.
More like we don't want to crash our only car when we don't have another means of transportation, and oops, now we can't get to work.
It's great to say "the system is broken and must be replaced." I agree! But nobody who says that, me included, has ever had anything resembling an actual plan to replace the system or to prevent something even worse from taking over once the system is destroyed.
Everyone gave the GOP shit for screaming about how Obamacare needs to be "repealed and replaced" but never saying what it should be replaced with (though that was because the "replace" part was a lie and they just wanted to go back to the bad old days of people being trapped in a job or entirely unable to get insurance because of a preexisting condition). It's the same thing with people saying the entire system of government needs to be replaced.
It's all well and good to say "choose another system of governance" but how do we implement this change? What is the mechanism under which we can replace our current system of government with Swiss democracy, without the old government just saying "lolno" and bombing it to shit? The only method I can think of is a constitutional convention, and right now we're closer to the right wing being able to call one and rewrite it to take pur rights back 200 years than we are to leftists implementing Swiss democracy.
Like... I would be thrilled if that were within the realm of possibility, but as it stands any possible options for dramatically overhauling our system of governance is more likely to lurch us straight into permanent hard-right minority rule by a bunch of fascists. That's what I mean when I say I've never seen an actual plan by leftists to overhaul the system--it's all arguing about what the sexy end goal should be, without bothering to talk about the boring minutiae of how to actually get to it. So far as I can tell, the "plan" to make all these needed changes, so far as any thought is put into it at all, is just a silent assumption of either "we lobby our politicians and they do what we tell them and nobody opposes our ideas" or "we do a violent revolution and kill all the bad guys without harming the good guys and we definitely win and accomplish our goal without someone else taking advantage of the chaos to do a fascism instead," depending on how radical the change is.
without the old government just saying "lolno" and bombing it to shit?
Make sure the old government doesn't have enough votes.
options for dramatically overhauling our system of governance is more likely to lurch us straight into permanent hard-right minority rule by a bunch of fascists.
Not the point. Trump needs to be defeated, and the way we're going to do that is voting for Biden. There's no other way. It's not going to happen. You are absolutely deluded if you think there is another way.
After we fend off the Trump bullshit, then, yes, we have to make actual change to push us much further left. I don't get how all the ultra-leftists cannot fathom this simple fact.
Because Trump is still a fucking threat, you assclown. His cronies are still in office. We are going to have to keep fighting this fight where it needs to be fought, then when that fight is done, THEN we push to the actual left. Is this so goddamn fucking hard for you "LOL DONT VOTE BIDEN SO TRUMP CAN BE PRESIDENT AGAIN" fucktwaddlers to understand?
I dislike them both. I think they are both horribly corrupt with different ideologies. I won't support either of them. I'm voting for RFK jr. The only sane and reasonable choice in this election.
Right? "the only sane choice"? The antivaxxer? The "covid is a bioweapon" guy? The "I don't think we need a ceasefire in Gaza" guy. That guy? What a fucking joke.
I want to up vote you for the chuckle you gave me, but I did that once with Trump and too many people took it seriously, and he ended up being the president.
This precise sentiment has gotten me told off a few times now. Usually with someone yelling the word "Genocide" over and over so I can't get a word in. People are so fucking dumb it's actually unbelievable.
Whatever my frustration, I just want us all to work together even after we get Biden a second term. The only reason, ONLY REASON, the GOP have their power is honestly because we can't stop slap fighting long enough to plant a foot in their asses. This would also work for the Democrats. We do have two feet. Whatever our perspectives and opinions, there is a single neigh universal truth we can all accept:
Putlers troll farms are maximally amplifying the Gaza tragedy in order to divide the west. The tragedy that his Iranian friends probably started for him.
Or… hmm yes of course Putin trolls love the Palestinian genocide as it distracts from Ukraine but maybe just maybe tax payers are existentially fed up with the US committing a genocide with their money and lying straight faced to tax payers about the impossibility of doing anything about it?
If not voting helps Trump then it helps Biden too. Trying to paint people who don't like Biden as Trump supporters is a propaganda meme that's trying to gaslight us all.
Then everyone should be voting third party. This 2 party system is going to lead to a complete shutdown of our ability to govern and it has already made the US into a phony democracy. Peoples willingness to participate in it and just accept it is why the country has gone to shit. Because most of the people in the US can't think outside their narrow worldview of bipolar red vs blue tribalism.
The ideal would be what you say, having more than 2 options.
The reality is we do not have that system. We have exactly 2 choices because of our voting laws and system.
If you want to talk about voting 3rd party let's first get the system changed so that even works. I want it too, but blindly ignoring how FPTP voting and the electoral college works so you can feel better isn't helping anything.
Put another way. We have a trolley problem. We have 2 tracks and both will cause some harm, but one does WAY more than the other. But you are saying you won't even acknowledge there is a lever because you would rather be off down a nice grassy trail to a beautiful town on the lakeside. Yeah, that's great, I would too, but the tracks don't go there yet. We have to build the rail to get there first. And arguing about it doesn't change the reality we are stuck in.
The system is designed to enforce a two party system. If you and people who agree with you start to vote third party then the party you disagree with the MOST gets an advantage. It's called the spoiler effect.
In order to get rid of the two part system you have to get rid of first past the post voting.
Yes, first-past-the-post voting results in a two-party system; however, it doesn't dictate which two parties are in power. Dominant parties have dropped out of favor in the past and been replaced with a new two-party pairing. Its been a while since the Whig party was an option.
Different actions, same outcome. The US system effectively turns voting into 2 party voting. 3rd party vote is the essentially the same as not voting because your vote won't count for anything.
Let's say in your state Biden gets 200 votes, Trump gets 199 votes. You, for the sake of the argument, get 2 votes. Let's say you vote third party. What's the outcome? Biden wins. But what if you don't vote at all? Biden still wins. If you give both votes to Trump then Trump wins.
Now you may argue that if you vote third party then maybe you could instead swing the vote for third party. That is insanely unlikely, but let's say that happens and your state ends up voting third party. That is still, let's say 10, points to third party while all the other states split their votes between Biden and Trump. So that's 10 points to 3rd party, 200+ to Biden and Trump. All you can achieve is to take away points from either candidate and that may swing the election towards one of two candidates, but your candidate will not win anyway.
In short, voting third party does nothing. Best you can hope for is to disrupt the existing voting process but that's is pretty unlikely. You might as well not even vote.
Ok with genocide. Otherwise relatively progressive. Has passed major important legislation.
Ok with genocide. Wants to be a dictator. Appointed half of the Supreme Court majority that took away women’s right to abortion. Will probably strip more rights if elected. Cut taxes on the wealthy and will probably do it again.
You can throw away your vote, but come inauguration, you will have a president who is ok with genocide.
I think some of these people have to be trolls. We're basically in the trolley problem where the trolley is headed for 100,000 people, and if you pull the lever it will only kill 1. You can't abstain from pulling the lever and act like you're completely innocent of the deaths of the masses.
the trolley problem tests you ethical framework, it does not have a prescribed solution. your answer to it helps you understand your own approach. deontologists never pull the lever.
I've asked folks who aren't voting for Biden what they think the odds of their vote reducing genocide in the real world is, and all I've gotten is crickets.
Given that there doesn't seem to be much confidence there, the real world results are likely trump or biden.
Trump has folks in his party alluding to nukes when saying Palestine has to be ended quickly, even trump himself has stated that Israel has to end the war quickly. Therefore I suggest that Trump will result in far more lives lost than Biden.
Folks on Lemmy are typically left-leaning.
This means that a Lemmy user voting third party could've been a vote for Biden, which in a binary choice results in less lives lost. Yes, I know, Biden centrist, etc etc, but he's to the left of the absolute insanity that is the republican party.
However instead some folks value a clean conscience over real world results, and vote third party/abstain. If these votes would've otherwise gone to Biden, then they have made a trump presidency more likely, which has the real world effect of resulting in more lives lost.
I'm fine with people voting with their conscience, but I just want folks to acknowledge whether or not their vote makes a trump presidency (therefore more genocide) more likely. Most people just seem to think "I'm not voting for genocide so my hands are clean and I'm good!" and stick their head in the sand.
So, you’re okay with not having a clean conscience? Or, other voters should be okay with not having a clear conscience? If Biden winning is more important to you than having a clean conscience. Vote for him. But don’t pressure people that choose to have a clear conscience.
You're implying that asking people what they think the real world results of their choices are is being the thought police? That seems a little... diluted.
If you’re okay with people voting their conscience, then you can’t be upset when they do that. If you are upset when they don’t vote your way, that’s the policing of thought.
I'm fine with people voting with their conscience, but I just want folks to acknowledge whether or not their vote makes a trump presidency (therefore more genocide) more likely. Most people just seem to think "I'm not voting for genocide so my hands are clean and I'm good!" and stick their head in the sand.
I'm not upset if they do, nor do I expect them to vote my way. I just want to encourage them to discuss the real world effects of their choice. I just want to make sure they're internally consistent in their reasoning. For example, another commentor said they've voted for third party since 2008, and my response was for them to simply carry on doing so.
You can label discourse as "thought policing", but then that casts an extremely wide net that cheapens the term as used by Orwell.
People who are choosing not to vote for Biden are doing so because of a genocide that is happening NOW. You want to question them on contingent hypothetical real world results of a Trump presidency that may, or may not, happen in the FUTURE.
You’re trying to scare voters by telling them a dragon 🐉 is outside, when a venomous hydra is already in the room with them.
You’re concern trolling and “just asking questions,” it reeks of desperation.
People who are choosing not to vote for Biden are doing so because of a genocide that is happening NOW. You want to question them on contingent hypothetical real world results of a Trump presidency that may, or may not, happen in the FUTURE.
Oh so they can reason about a hypothetical future if they vote third party, but they can't do so if it's about a trump presidency? That's hilarious. Or are you saying they unable reason about a hypothetical future at all?
Holy shit my man I'm asking folks to tell me what THEY think is going to happen as a consequence of their actions. If their reasoning is so shit that that question shakes them to their core, get good.
Unlike voters in many other industrialized countries, Americans tend to vote from this “retrospective” perspective. Studies show that Americans view elections – especially presidential ones – as a referendum on the past performance of an officeholder, a political party or the current administration.
Do you think retrospective voters use the past to try and inform reasoning about the future?
IMO there has to be some level of this happening, otherwise retrospective voters would only have an opinion on those that already have served, and would be essentially picking from those who have not served at random.
From my perspective, they are implying that your belief that voting third party or abstaining gives you a clear conscience makes you a self-centered, arrogant fool. Because the result of your action (or inaction) will increase the likelihood of the more bad thing happening.
To me, that's not a clear conscience. That's ignorance. That's explicitly choosing to ignore the consequences of your (in)action. That's short-sightedness to the degree that someone would expect of a preschooler. One with behavioral problems.
That’s a lot of words to say you are okay with genocide. I’m not gonna castigate voters for voting against a candidate that enables it. Maybe I’ll change my mind once I get to middle school. It depends on how long recess is.
Our choices this election are genocide with a side of an untoppped baked potato, or genocide with a side of radioactive flaming diarrhea.
There is no third option. The third option is that the waiter brings you one of the two and you have to accept it.
At least one way, we get a bland potato. It sucks, but that's the way this restaurant is run. We can't just get up and go to another restaurant. But, maybe if we can just find it to ignore the genocide (which, by the way, the chef is really limited in what they can do without the support of the rôtisseur, especially when he gets a couple line cooks to side with him), we might be able to have no genocide next time we come back. Otherwise, we're all gonna get sick being close to all the radioactive diarrhea and the whole place is gonna get shut down.
I should've been more explicit - what I posted is focused on folks who are single issue voting here.
EDIT: If Palestine is the only thing someone cares about, voting third party is likely actually hurting their cause. However you are choosing who to vote for based on many additional issues, which is why this doesn't really apply to you.
Voting third party right now also just perpetuates both parties. There are enough people in this country to elect anyone from the major parties, so a third party can’t win unless one of those parties collapses. The only way a party collapses is when it consistently loses elections.
The republicans won’t consistently lose elections as long as progressives don’t vote for democrats, so both parties will continue on. The majority of the people in this country are left of center, so the only way republicans win is by suppressing votes, and one of the ways they do that is by propping up progressive third party candidates.
If we truly want a progressive party, making sure republicans never win elections is the way to do it. Then either the Democratic Party will shift left and republicans will regroup under a new less extreme conservative party, or the Democratic Party will shift right as it absorbs all the republicans and a new progressive left party will rise. Both ways result in a more progressive set of major parties.
If your morality prioritizes staunch adherence to standards over harm reduction, you have a stupid sense of morality.
It’s the kind of morality where someone would rather let a child die than push them out of the way of a speeding car, simply because pushing them would harm them.
Your morality should lead you to making decisions that result in the least harm. Look at it this way: if all of the people who voted third party instead of Hillary because Hillary wasn’t [insert moral standard here] enough had sucked it up and voted for Hillary, access to abortion would still be legal nationwide. (This assumes enough people to get her elected voted third party over moral objections.)
Trump is the worst president in my life time, by a huge margin, and he’s even more in favor of genocide than Biden, demonstrably. So if your sense of morality causes you to help put him in charge of our country again, in my mind, you’re a fucking moron.
I’m not talking about drug harm reduction. I’m talking about the reduction of harm. Put another way, aiming to reduce the amount of harm your actions lead to.
That’s a nice platitude, but there are only two outcomes, no matter how much you might wish there was a third. Your options are to help, abstain, or hurt. Abstaining means you’d rather not help, so again, in my mind, you’re a moron.
Third party candidates are only viable when one of the major parties collapses, and the major parties only collapse when they consistently lose. So, if you actually want a viable third party, you should vote for the major party you dislike the least. Otherwise, you’re just perpetuating both.
Rebellion? I don't like hearing such a word from you," Ivan said with feeling. "One cannot live by rebellion, and I want to live. Tell me straight out, I call on you--answer me: imagine that you yourself are building the edifice of human destiny with the object of making people happy in the finale, of giving them peace and rest at last, but for that you must inevitably and unavoidably torture just one tiny creature, that same child who was beating her chest with her little fist, and raise your edifice on the foundation of her unrequited tears--would you agree to be the architect on such conditions? Tell me the truth."
"No, I would not agree," Alyosha said softly.
"And can you admit the idea that the people for whom you are building would agree to accept their happiness on the unjustified blood of a tortured child, and having accepted it, to remain forever happy?"
"No, I cannot admit it.
Ok cool. Your choice is between genocide, and genocide but worse. You can proclaim how righteous and moral you are that all the pain everyone around you is feeling is not your fault, because you merely threw your vote away, but that won’t change the outcome, and it won’t make you anything but a moron.
“And can you admit the idea that the people for whom you are building would agree to accept their happiness on the unjustified blood of a tortured child, and having accepted it, to remain forever happy?”
But then if Trump wins because you didn’t vote for either, then you’re ok with Genocide+ rather than Genocide light. Meaning you have to vote for the lesser of the two evils if no matter what you do the majority are voting for the only two who are likely to win.
You’re either incredibly stupid, a troll, or are being obstinate on purpose.
Genocide light? Seriously?!? If the other guy is stupid, you are stupid+
There is no democracy if you are supporting genocide. There is no election worth voting on if the outcome is same fucking fascist, just with different colored flags. And don’t give me the lie how you’re gonna do something about a ‘genocide light’ if your guy is elected. Fuck off
This whole country needs to stop sucking Kissinger’s dick and change this bloodthirsty, greedy fascist system.
Ask the people in Gaza what they think about "Roe got overturned".
After all said and nothing done, we are paying for those bullets that murder their children by accepting and even promoting a system that gives us braindead mouthpieces for weapon manufacturers to vote for.
Why do you think I’m upset that you are voting for Biden? You should vote for whomever you want. I’m voting for genocide Joe and I understand the implications of that. What I won’t do is plead with others to do the same. It is their choice, not mine. I understand why someone would vote for Biden. But , I also understand others have different priorities and material interests. Forcing, or shaming others to vote your choice is not democratic… it’s authoritarian. And isn’t that what we wish to prevent?
I’m an American, I’ve been drowning in piss my whole life. You want me to hate you for voting for Biden, even though he is helping a genocide. I won’t, because I understand you have your reasons. Or you want me to hate others because they won’t vote for Biden, because he’s helping a genocide. I’m not gonna do that either, because I support their cause.
Your anger is better directed at the institutions that allowed us to arrive at this juncture.
November is quite cold where I’m at, we like to go hiking or skiing. Or staying in and watching movies. A nice dinner with friends? I hope I gave you at least one good idea what to do in November.
But you can go out and vote for a sociopath and genocide denier or for a racist rapist and when those clowns start killing and bombing some other people somewhere on the globe, you can just blame the Chinese or Icelanders for making you vote for a lesser evil…
Small problem. A person who is against genocide would not be okay with a genocide under Trump either, so why should they be okay with a genocide under Biden?
The outcome of the election is going to be Trump or Biden. NOBODY ELSE IS GOING TO WIN.
So given that you have to choose the person less likely to escalate the situation, the saner one of the two.
I’m not saying it’s good I think it’s fucking abhorrent, but there is no choice.
To be abundantly clear about my stance on Palestine. I am out every weekend protesting in solidarity with Palestine. I am spreading awareness of the issue wherever I can and I am taking direct action against the companies that support the genocide.
Let me ask you this. What do you think is going to happen if you don’t vote?
If a genocide is going to occur regardless of the vote, then the vote doesn’t matter.
Let me ask you this. What do you think is going to happen if you don’t vote?
In regards to what? The genocide? Project 2025? Healthcare?
If people want to vote for Joe Biden to preserve LGBT and minority rights, that’s their choice. If someone wants to not vote for Biden because he is aiding in a genocide, that’s their choice.
It’s egotistical to think that my priorities are more important than others.
Dude people ain’t voting for Biden for any reason. They’re voting against the lunatic that tried to incite an insurrection. The dude that has the mentality of a child.
That’s it. Trump is a sociopath and people don’t want him in charge of nuclear weapons.
As to the rest of your comment. Yes you can do what you want but alls people are saying is Trump would far worse in every regard and not voting against him is basically saying your cool with that.
Does that make sense? I don’t mean that in a condescending way, I’m really wanting to know if you understand my point of view and the consensus of this thread. And the majority of people.
If you’re not voting Biden who are you voting for?
If you want to me to say that I’m voting for Biden, I will. The question everyone should be asking themselves is why do they need that validation. Is it only okay to vote for Biden if everyone else does? If I change my mind in the next six months, and decide to vote for Cornel West or Jill Stein, is it not my choice? The people that have decided to not vote for Biden because of the genocide aren’t gonna be persuaded by randos pressuring them on the internet. It’s not their fault he is helping Israel do a genocide.
I literally said in my last comment it is your choice do what you want.
I’ve also covered, ad-nauseam, that the only person getting elected is a genocide supporting one and one of those is less dangerous than the other.
How many times do you want to ask the same questions to get the same answer.
I DONT SUPPORT GENOCIDE.
I DO SUPPORT PALESTINE.
ISRAEL IS AN APARTHEID STATE.
WE THE PEOPLE ARE POWERLESS TO STOP IT.
BIDEN OR TRUMP WILL WIN.
BIDEN IS LESS FUCKING INSANE THAN TRUMP.
BIDEN IS A GENOCIDE SUPPORTER.
Hypothetically, I think there would be no difference than what is occurring now. The rhetoric from his administration would be more belligerent though. If you take the genocide out of the equation, Biden is clearly the better choice. Unfortunately, it is part of the equation.
Trump and the other Republicans will say a lot, but they aren’t going to act any different than what Biden and Blinken are already doing with Palestine. The only difference is the symbolic language the Democrats use to assuage their voters. What are they going to do, send more arms and money faster?
Trump and the other Republicans will say a lot, but they aren’t going to act any different than what Biden and Blinken are already doing with Palestine
Muslim travel ban, Golan heights, and Jerusalem recognition + US embassy adoption there suggests that there are real world acts that the administration would do differently to me, what do you think?
What are they going to do, send more arms and money faster?
Precisely, afaik he doesn't give a shit about the people of Palestine, he's more worried about Israels bad PR and wants them to end it fast.
EDIT: just to check, did you read the JNS article? It's pretty bad, and he spells out exactly what he wants to do... A small excerpt is below.
“On day one, we’ll restore our travel ban. We had a travel ban because we didn’t want people coming into our country who really loved the idea of blowing our country up,” he said. He called the ban an “amazing success.”
“We didn’t have one incident in four years, because we kept bad people out of our country,” he claimed.
“I’ll also be implementing strong ideological screenings for all immigrants coming in,” he
said. “If you hate America, if you want to abolish Israel, if you sympathize with jihadists, then we don’t want you in our country and you’re not going to be getting into our country.”
Trump also said he would cancel student visas of Hamas sympathizers.
“The college campuses are being taken over, and all of the resident aliens who joined in the pro-jihadist protests this month, nobody’s seen anything like it,” he said. “Come 2025, we will find you, and we will deport you.”
...
As president, Trump would “put every single university and college president on notice,” he said. “The American taxpayer will not subsidize the creation of terrorist sympathizers on American soil.”
That last bit is actual government thought policing.
It's definitely not working, but all evidence I've seen suggests it's right.
Do you agree with me that "Biden is bad, but trump will be worse" is a correct statement?
I think the tiredness you're referring to is a result of people voting emotionally and not logically, or just being exhausted with this whole shitstorm.
I'm starting to suspect that the arguments seem as nauseam because I'm trying to reason people out of a decision they didn't reason themselves into - i.e. they're voting emotionally, and not logically. Inconvenient questions get ignored, and we're left with very surface level arguments.
I particularly saw some users comments reflected in this excerpt in the retrospective voting article you shared:
In his classic book “The Responsible Electorate,” the late Harvard University political scientist V.O. Key Jr. suggests that judging a president’s or his party’s performance in office presents a perfect opportunity for the voter to play “rational God of vengeance or reward.”
Perhaps they're voting this way to try and recapture efficacy in a world where they feel they have very little.
You seem genuinely interested in this topic. One I spent a considerable time researching last year and left me disillusioned. A study that may help is from professors Adam Dyne and John Holbein: Noisy Retrospection: The Effect of Party Control on Policy Outcomes. It’s quite a read but demonstrates:
Our results suggest that voters may struggle to truly hold government coalitions accountable, as objective performance metrics appear to be largely out of the immediate control of political coalitions.
Simply put, in large elections with millions of people, our votes count very little.
We should still vote. It matters for local elections, but when it gets to the state level and higher, the impact of our votes have little to no effect.
So.... What do you think are the odds that your third party vote improves the situation in Palestine?
If your third party vote makes it more likely that Trump wins and results in more bloodshed, that is a choice you contributed to, and blood is still on your hands.
virtue-signalling
: the act or practice of conspicuously displaying one's awareness of and attentiveness to political issues, matters of social and racial justice, etc., especially instead of taking effective action
The argument for voting against left-wing or socialist candidates on the grounds that they can’t win and are therefore helping the right wing into power has, of course, been a time-worn argument in the United States against bucking the two-party system. Engels, in an 1893 letter to an American colleague, pointed out that in the United States, the formation of a workers’ party is hindered by the "Constitution…which makes it appear as though every vote were lost that is cast for a candidate not put up by one of the two governing parties." isreview
A tribe holds a vote to either cross a bridge to side A or stay on side B. Staying on side A means you won't have much food. Going to side B means you still won't have much food, but also most of the food is poisonous.
Part of the tribe (Group C) says "I don't want to starve, I refuse to vote in a way that accepts malnourishment as a solution!" Group C also opposes eating poisonous food. This partial group votes to try and find a better source of food (option C).
48% of people vote A. 49% of people vote B. 3% of people vote C.
Surprise, surprise, Group C had 0 impact on the starving situation AND helped facilitate the eating of poisonous food.
I agree with you. If we could get the entirety of the democratic party to vote green/left, that would be super helpful. We both know that's not happening in America because of the broken electoral and political system. If we could suppress option C, we wouldn't be having this conversation at all, but there would surely be other complaints to be had regarding that matter.
In the end, the Group C votes are equivalent to not voting, which translates to having 0 impact on the outcome of vote. This exemplifies complicity with either option A or B.
Sorry, you're right. My story doesn't quite match the election dynamic. In the hypothetical, Group C should be extremely aware that they cannot win the popular vote, since most tribe members are either unaware of or have no faith in option C.
In which case, yes, continuing to vote for option C is complicity with outcome A or B.
Definition of complicit denotes otherwise. If making the right choice is unpopular, that doesn’t make you complicit with another choice. You’re conflating the two choices. Why is it Group C’s fault the other groups can’t get their shit together. Stop bullying people to vote the way you want. It makes you look weak.
Cool, I'll give you a pass on the genocide, but you will still be as responsible as anyone who voted for Trump for all the other terrible things he said he will do that you are doing nothing to prevent.
Its literally impossible for democrats to not spread disinformation about leftists by claiming anyone who doesn't vote Biden is actively advocating for not voting. Hell I see a bunch of it in this comment section.
Democrats will claim they aren't fascist but they can't help but check off all the bullet points.
