Third parties -- thowing away your vote?

My theory, and I kid you not, is that you must have an even number of parties. An odd number of legitimate vote-winning parties will always lead to complete dominance by one of them. And yes, if Nader had only been unself-inflated enough to say "don't vote for me in swing states," GWB would not currently be president. Nader received thousands of votes in Florida, far more than the hotly contested final margin of victory there.

As for "throwing your vote away," I say it depends. If a person is truly convinced that both major party candidates are essentially the same, then I can understand the minor party vote (e.g. green). If, however, you see any important difference in the two major parties, and if any of the principles involved are important to you, I think you have to suck it up and vote for what you perceive to be the greater good. If you vote ideologically in that latter case, then you are essentially masturbating, just pleasing yourself but not doing anything for anybody else. Just my thoughts.

Along those lines, Nader's claim that Gore and Bush were basically identical seems to have a hollow ring these days, doesn't it?

 

It seemed at the time, and still seems to be completely stupid to vote for Nader if you're a Green and help the Republicans into office. How can putting the anti-Green party into power be good for the ethic?

 

What I understand from some of my more rabid greenie friends is that some green leaders (including Ralph) believe that the extremes of Bush et al. will actually help expand the green party. It's a perverse version of "things will have to get worse before they get better." I wish they would gamble with someone else's country and planet, but that's just me.

 

You should vote for the person one want to see elected. If that person is neither a Dem or a Rep, so be it. If you only vote for electable candidates, you may be voting for the lesser of two evils. That is throwing your vote away imo.

 

So, I should vote for Paul Wellstone in 2004? That will be just as useful, just as community conscious, just as compassionate to my fellow human beings, as a vote for Nader was in 2000. But hey, I want Wellstone to be president more than I want anyone else to be president. His being dead shouldn't get in my way.

 

You should vote for the candidates that you want to get elected. I'm not going to vote for Bush because he's not a Democrat. The two parties to me are worse (Republican) and worst (Democrat). I've voted liberatarian in the last election and I even ran for school board as a libertarian, but when you support private funding of extra-curricular activities, you aren't going to get many votes.

 

Nor will you get many votes when your talent looks like this...

http://www.rachelmills.com/calendar.html

When the GOP has this...

http://www.jerseygop.com/R_babes/

And the Dems have this...

http://www.babesagainstbush.com/main.html

 

Personally, I believe that if we had a STRONG third party, it would cause Americans (or at least her politicians) to have to build a consensus to get things done rather than having whichever party has a bare majority making all of the decisions. 40% of Americans identify themselves as independant and the rest are 30-30 split among Dems and Reps. If you remove the 10% of way out wackos from the 40% independants, that means that the people in the middle of the political spectrum should have as much power as the ones on the right or left. If the Dems or Reps wanted something done in a 3 party world, they would be forced to compromise and come up with a solution that, if not palatable to the other extreme, is at least supported by the people in the Middle Party.

I have not voted Dem or Rep in the presidential race in over a decade, though I would have voted for McCain if he had won the nomination over Bush. I vote for the one who is most palatable to me and if someone else thinks that I am throwing my vote away, then they can go [do something disgusting that I will leave to your imagination].

 

In most of the United States, one person's vote is meaningless because of rules favoring a two party system, gerrymandering and the electoral college. Most elections will not even be competitive. Compare the percentage of people who turnout in the United States for elections versus other countries, there's a reason it's so low here, it's because there's very little choice.

 

I proudly voted for Ralph Nader in 2000. Of course, I lived in Sugar Land -- so my vote didn't throw anything away. Probably the only vote in Sugar Land that didn't go to Bush.

If I lived in a so-called swing state, I'd have given it careful consideration. But I probably would have voted for Nader anyway -- philosophy and politics are two different things. Before the election, I honestly couldn't tell a difference between Bush and Gore. They were both owned by corporate interests, and I wasn't comfortable with either.

Left-wing Democrats (and liberals) didn't feel Gore represented them, so they voted Green. The Democratic Party lost the election (in part because of Greens). But now the Democratic Party will be much more likely to work for the liberal vote in 2004. The process is almost self-correcting, in a sense.

In 2004, I'm almost certainly voting Democrat. One, it looks like they're actually going to nominate someone with *some* liberal values (Dean). Two, I'd vote for Lucifer himself to get Bush out of office. But not Joe Lieberman.

 

Picking the lesser of 2 evils is a sellout; you're stabbing yourself in the back. If all the Nader supporters voted Democrat, what motivation would the Democratic Party have to actually cater to the desires of the Green Party members? They'd know those votes were in the bag because of the fear the idea of a Republican president would put in 3rd-party members. If you make them pay at the ballot box, they'll be forced to give concessions to get your vote. Have you noticed recent complaints that democratic candidates were veering further left? Don't you think Nader's success might have something to do with that? Elections aren't always about who you put in office. Politicians take them as litmus tests to determine what issues they'll pay attention to. If they genuinely fear they'll lose your vote, they may well try to accomodate you. If your vote isn't contingent on their performance, they may as well behave as they please.

 

I've heard those complaints from the uber-right, yes, but I don't know many liberals who really think the democratic party has moved to the left a bit. Instead, I believe the 2.5% green vote in the last election has pushed the democratic party even further to the center in an attempt to capture some of that middle ground. Policy by policy, dean is not more liberal than Gore, not at all. And now we even have Wesley running the dem. primary. How is that more liberal? That's just my view of it. Clearly, there are very different ways of viewing this issue.

I will say I am happy with anyone who votes at all, especially if they carefully consider their vote. It sounds like most all of us are in that category.

 

No, I think those "complaints" are coming from the GOP machine which would very much like to run against George McGovern rather than Howard Dean. And they would rather run against V. I. Lenin than George McGovern. If Lieberman were way out front, he too would be castigated for being too liberal. As would any Dem. It's just what they do. The same dynamic got Max Cleland on the "patriot" charge.

A fringe movement almost always has the opposite effect in that serious candidates take positions against you so as not to appear way off center. The Sister Souljah effect if you will.

The Green party needs to build from the local offices on up, get to the point where you have a few Congressmen and maybe a Governor or two and register at least 20% of the voters. That's when your dynamic will take hold. Until then, Greens will just make things worse in a national election. Perhaps I should say Nader and not Greens because if Nader is not running, there's probably very little influence on the national scene.

 

Damn. Did I not say anything else worthwhile?

 

I was about to blather about this, but I'm glad rimrocker got to state is so clearly instead. I agree completely with this sentiment, and I support the green party with my votes all the time on the local level. We even had an excellent green candidate for gov. in the recall election in California: Peter Camejo. Unlike Nader, he will fully disclose his personal finances, he has a real job, he can talk about topics other than the evil of corporations, and he has an engaging style of speaking!

Also, we almost just elected a green mayor of San Francisco. Matt Gonzalez received 47% of the vote in our recent runoff election.

 

I think your friend is way off base.

Just for example, I don't think the party that I most agree with (R), is going to change their position on abortion because I'm pro-choice. Your friend's argument may hold some merit with respect to local politics, but not national.

As far as the "wasting your vote" argument, there are two flaws with it.

One, if you believe that you are wasting your vote unless you only vote for a candidate in a situation where your vote is going to "make a difference," then any given individual would never vote in a national election unless that individual held a rational belief that their one vote was going to make a difference in the election.

Second, that argument ignores possible long term effect of the vote - that by supporting serious third party candidates, even ones who are not "electable," it will serve as encouragement for future potential third party candidates (e.g., Colin Powell).

I have voted independently for many years, beginning with John Anderson (still waiting for the long term effect to kick in ), and my friends have been making the same tired arguments as yours all these years. I don't know if this is true with respect to your friend or not, but in my case it was almost always a transparent attempt to get me to vote for their candidate of choice.

Strip away all the ideological arguments, however, and you are still left with this common sense question: If you don't vote for who you believe in, how can you later defend your choice?

 

If there was an instant run off in place, it wouldn't matter.

 

Fantastic point -- you could vote your conscience, and not have to worry about any of this "Should I vote for a guy I don't believe in because he's not as bad as the other guy?" crap.