Some of us are actually not Democrats or Republicans because we really think both sides are bad in different ways. I still voted though.
It’s still worth it to register for one of the major parties to vote in their primary and push them towards your actual politics. For example, I wouldn’t consider myself “a Democrat”, but I am registered to the party and I vote as progressive as I can in primaries.
But then you don’t get to brag about your enlightened centrism.
And some of us who are that way understand that in FPTP there can only be a winner from one of the major parties and we are choosing who we want to fight to push for changes.
I always vote for who I perceive as the lesser evil of the two. This year is no different. I’m not excited about what either candidate wants to fight for. I will oppose whoever is elected on multiple fronts.
The November elections are damage control. Unfortunately they always have been.
I voted, that should be enough, same as anyone.
Also, both sides are bad, in different ways.
Looking to shut up those people complaining about both sides from the sidelines? Put them in the game by passing electoral reform in your state.
Since they seem to know it all, let them show us how it’s done by replacing First-past-the-post voting, passing equal access and airtime laws, and switching away from a perpetual election cycle to something shorter and more reasonable.
Get them to prove to us they know how to do things by making third parties viable and doing away with the infamous spoiler effect that is inherent with FPTP voting.
More people involved in the poltical process, more people voting, more people voting = more democratic votes, more chances to defeat the republicans, more people to call out bullshit on the debate stage, no more canceled debates because of giant man babies.
Electoral reform is just win after win for the American people. I know the election season has people exhausted, but things don’t have to be this way. We can be free.
For anyone who already knows the truth of this meme, or who would like to know more about the vast methods of deception and how to spot and counter them, this DEFCON 32 talk is incredible.
DEF CON 32 - Counter Deception: Defending Yourself in a World Full of Lies - Tom Cross, Greg Conti
The Internet was supposed to give us access to the world’s information, so that people, everywhere, would be able to know the truth. But that’s not how things worked out. Instead, we have a digital deception engine of global proportions. Nothing that comes through the screen can be trusted, and even the things that are technically true have been selected, massaged, and amplified in support of someone’s messaging strategy.
Deception isn’t just about narratives - we see deception at every layer of the network stack, from spoofed electromagnetic signatures, to false flags in malware, to phony personas used to access networks and spread influence. They hide in our blindspots, exploit our biases, and fill our egos while manipulating our perceptions.
How do we decide what is real? This talk examines time-tested maxims that teach the craft of effective deception, and then inverts those offensive principles to provide defensive strategies. We’ll explore ways to counter biases, triangulate information sources, detect narratives, and how hackers can build tools that can change the game.
I think both Dems and Republicans suck in very different and not proportionate ways, but I am also a very big proponent of voting. Go vote! It’s your duty.
I find OP’s post functionally defeatest. It hinges on this theory that there really is only one choice every election season. You must vote Democrat - whether it’s Sherrod Brown or Eric Adams - and you can never question how these officials behave during an election season.
The Dems don’t have any real duty towards their voters, or even an obligation to do a particularly good job of governing. They can just point at Republicans, say “Worse! Vote for us or that’s who you get”, then blast people with anxiety-inducing advertisement until folks panic.
The end result of this system is one in which Dems win by maximizing anxiety, rather than improving quality of life for anyone.
There are vastly larger numbers of choices in local and legislative races. And I encourage people to work hard to more variety in local and legislative races to push your values instead of only checking in every 4 years. The primary is the key time to push for who you want as the candidate.
During the actual election though, with FPTP, it unfortunately is that reductive. You are stuck choosing who is the lesser evil or who you want to push for change. The November presidential election is like public transportation. You may not like the conditions of the train or the exact destination the bus ends up at, but you take the bus that gets you closer to your destination.
I don’t disagree with you.
I find that the thing people need to remember is that the general election is purely damage control time. For actual change, and getting candidates that don’t suck, the work needs to already be done by the time the election rolls around.
Politics is marketing. Governing is the slow boring of hard boards. You only get there with dilligence, conviction, and commitment to the idea that you are planting the trees that will shade your grandchildren.
Politics is marketing.
This, except that the foundations that lead to change are laid on election night. Yes the cement was mixed and the scaffolding raised, but today sets the tools we have to work with to enact that change for the next 4 (or rarely 2) years.
Right, the election is the Primary. In this case it was 2020 when I voted for Burnie. Biden won (and then handed over to Harris). That’s who was chosen, and I’m okay with that.
The local candidates and party officials matter more than the final presidential vote. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t vote for President.
I’ve noticed liberals on Lemmy love voting until you mention it’s for a socialist that represents your values.
How Democratic of them.
If you want to organize and elect socialists at local levels of power who form coalitions with other left wing groups to coordinate against conservatives, I will help you do it.
If you do nothing but whine online and avoid politics to vote for a socialist candidate every 4 years during the presidential elections in a FPTP system, you’re a moron.
I can see you understand the flaws of First past the post voting quite well. We are going to need people like you to change this mathematically flawed voting system.
Feel free to stop by my ask lemmy post to discuss replacing First-past-the-post voting in your state when you’re ready. Thanks.
We’re working on it in my state. It’s got the support of our local Democratic Party and because of the way our state legislature works, the next time to push further is the 2025 session.
I’d say most people think a wasted vote in a contentious election with a racist, rapist, fascist who wants to end democracy is stupid.
If you were to say, I don’t know, be working with local parties at the town, city, and state level to grow them and get them into positions, making them viable for the presidency down the road - not stupid! Awesome, in fact.
Telling people vote for a 3rd party in this presidential election?
Stupid. Very, very stupid. Yes, it will be frowned upon. Because its stupid. And people should be telling you how stupid it is. Because it is.
In my experience, most people voting for 3rd parties care more for their own sense of morals than they do with actual outcomes. This election has not changed that in the slightest, and it’s even more open and obvious when the question of ‘ok, then what happens?’ comes up. I’ve been told by a supposed anti-genocide person that it’s ok if Palestinians get genocide harder because of the Democrats win they won’t pay attention to the progressives.
Like, how can you take someone seriously that is openly advocating for a path that makes their cause worse?
Huh? I’m for everyone voting. I just want everyone to vote.
If third parties wanted to actually do some good in the country, you’d see them running locally and encouraging either ranked-choice voting or STAR voting (Score, then automatic runoff).
Third parties run at all levels of government and they would actually benefit from eliminating first past the post polling far more than the major parties.
The bitter fact is that a winning candidate has no incentive to reform the voting system that put them in power.
Why would a dominant party want to give any competitor an advantage?
Because they care about maintaining their voters far more than enticing non-voters. If you listen to legislators and their staff for example, the way they perceive it is that non-voters may as well not exist in their minds, but eroding voters get attention.
The fact that you only ever hear of third parties every four years really illustrates what their true objectives are.
The fact that you only ever hear about ranked choice voting when you tell Democrat you’re thinking of voting third part illustrates what their true objectives are.
(Also, I see third candidate parties in every midterm and local election I vote in at all levels of government. I have no idea what you’re talking about).
(Also also, anyone reading this who lives in a swing state and hasn’t voted yet, please, just votes for Harris. She sucks, but Trump is even more dangerous now that he has a staff full of enablers and an actual plan. We have to beat him.)
Not having RCV doesn’t make anything worse.
Promoting third-parties without RCV in place does.
Well, third parties have always existed and will always exist, so it sounds like the Democrats need to get cracking on RCV. That is, unless they don’t actually want RCV because it might disrupt the duopoly that empowers them, and they’d prefer that third-parties remain a boogeyman they can use to bully people I to voting for them (or a scapegoat for their losses).
Democrats have been behind, or at least caucused to support, most of the RCV initiatives that have been put forward.
Statewide, sure, but there’s no broad discussion of abolishing FPTP polling like there is eliminating the Electoral College.
Don Beyer(D) proposed the Fair Representation Act in 2017 that included implementing RCV for electing representatives to the House.
It’s much easier to sell a national popular vote, since people are used to popular votes already. RCV will be much easier to push federally when there are plenty of states that use it locally. Until then it’s largely a non-starter.
Why is it called score, then automatic runoff instead of star, then automatic runoff?
Yup, they know they’re outnumbered so they try every trick in the book to stop the Democrat bloc surplus from voting.
The destruction of the republican party via increased voter and representation rights represents the single greatest possible “progressive” leftward shift of the US political window. Emphasis on “possible”. Conservatives are a minority party and their extreme views do not represent modern America.
The road to a more progressive, equitable future is through the democrats. It doesn’t end there.
Republicans winning offices means more long lasting legislation to clear, more conservative judicial appointments, etc.
Teaching THIS (2024) democratic party a lesson is worthless if it comes with 30+ years of conservative judicial backsliding.
With election reform we don’t need for the Republican party to stop existing to get more viable options in the voting booth.
Very true, my point is the current republican party is trumped up by systemic inertia. They are a minority position.
Teaching THIS (2024) democratic party a lesson is worthless if it comes with 30+ years of conservative judicial backsliding.
And on top of that, when has “teaching the party a lesson” actually worked out in the peoples’ favor?
It hasn’t ever. Always vote for the lesser evil, it’s less evil.
The destruction of the republican party via increased voter and representation rights represents the single greatest possible “progressive” leftward shift of the US political window.
Absolute pipe dream. They aren’t even going to lose control of the Senate. They’ll have dozens of governorships and legislative majorities when this election is over.
Liberals are fucking delusional if they think this election changes any of that.
My guy I’m saying it’s the goal in general not this election. It is the existential goal of anyone left of maga.
You should review the electoral college maps compared to population, in addition to gerrymandering. Democrats actively seek to improve voter access, proper districting and so on. If those topics are continued and eventually successful, the republican party is exposed for the minority population that is is. Republicans cannot win in a “fair” fight.
Lastly my point regarding judicial appointments is critical here: redistricting and voter access issues are won in the courtroom. Reducing conservative appointments is absolutely possible with a Harris win.
Delusional is thinking all this happens in one term, while ignoring the backslide of progress a trump term would mean.
it’s the goal in general not this election.
One Party Rule is the goal of both parties, and equally unattainable for similar reasons.
Democrats actively seek to improve voter access, proper districting and so on
They do not, as evidenced by the failure to advance DC Statehood when they had a majority.
my point regarding judicial appointments is critical here
Republicans will control the Senate at the end of this election. Harris will not shift the balance of power under these conditions.
thinking all this happens in one term
Do you think this is the first term Dems and GOPers have been struggling for power?
I do not. Why would I?
Trump has made judicial appointments a key goal of his first term, so it stands to reason he’d do the same now. Avoiding that is progress, even if Harris gets zero.
Edit: to avoid playing nickel and dime debate club:
The democratic party is wildly imperfect and often ineffectual. I’m not satisfied, and I’m not cheerleading for them.
Harris may also be wildly imperfect and often ineffectual. That’s still better than the massive equality, stability and integrity sink trump represents and that’s what I’m arguing for.
Trump has made judicial appointments a key goal of his first term
McConnell made it a key goal. That’s why he blocked Garland for 10 months under Obama.
Schumer has not. That’s why he let a SCOTUS nomination fall into Trump’s hands a mere 10 weeks before Biden took office.
Please note I had a late edit that should head off this back and forth on specifics.
Find your polling location. Go vote!
Your ballot will be deciding much more than just the president. Even if you did theoretically think both presidential canidates were equal in all regards (they aren’t), then vote for the down ballot races!
Keep your local school boards from having insane people on it that will ban books and harm your kids or your neighbors’s.
Vote for the constitutional ammendment questions and ballot initiatives. For instance, many states have either pro and anti abortion questions on their ballot.
100% this.
Republicans tell me the same thing.
They are technically correct in that a first past the post system will always reduce to a 2 party contest. The fact that conservatives are more consistent and reliable voters is where that distinction breaks down in reality. Non-voting and splitting the left wing coalition hurts the Democratic Party more.
The democratic party should get to it replacing First-past-the-post voting then. Stopping the Republicans is priority right?
voter suppression and voting are not the same thing.
a vote for third parties is as valid as a vote for a primary color.
That’s why a big portion of the funding for parties or candidates that pull from the political left in the US are extremely wealthy conservatives, right?
no, you are incorrect.
probably your vantage point.
it’s funny how confused you guys get from concise, direct answers.
Someone baselessly gainsaying something I’ve said isn’t confusing in the slightest. And what I said is really easy to verify or refute.
Though I was perhaps not specific enough when I said strictly “funding” as that can be interpreted as strictly the money a candidate gets in direct donations instead of including paying all the moving parts of a candidate’s run including PACs, et al. that cover legal fees and organization.
“…isn’t confusing in the slightest.”
of course, you’re one of those dizzy-headed people that think super clearly.
your comments are starting to make more sense.
“Though I was perhaps not specific enough…”
certainly.
“as that can be interpreted as strictly the money…”
still irrelevant to voting being valid regardless of the party you vote for, but have fun.
I like tangents.
Except when the votes literally aren’t counted.
that would be voter suppression.
which, yes, is the same thing as voter suppression.
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