this post was submitted on 09 Apr 2024
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United States | News & Politics
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This is the answer. Don't vote for third party candidates, by that point it's too late.
Vote for candidates in the primaries that are adamant about voting reform/ranked choice voting. Normalize it at state and local levels. Then, it will become a viable option at the national level.
This can happen quickly with the right advocacy and the right candidates, but good candidates are indeed hard to come by.
Ya, I sometimes encourage running for office along with my encouragement to vote. It seems mostly only shitty people run for office, this needs to change.
Kinda goes with being rich. Which is pretty much a requirement to run for small offices in most of the country (pay is shit) and definitely requires to run in major races (advertising and organizing is expensive). So only rich dudes run, and you generally have to be some type of agile to get rich in the first place (there are exceptions, but not many).
I think this is mostly true but not a fact. If you're running for senate in Kentucky then yes. But if you run for local or state lower office and do things a bit differently it's possible.
Think https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justin_Jones_(Tennessee_politician)
I don't believe he was or is rich and is making a difference.
Also, the reason for running for office isn't necessarily to win. Look at RFK Jr. running for president, there is 0% chance of him winning, he has other goals. He's trying to take votes away from candidates to swing the election.
Another non-winning goal could be to move or expand the "Overton Window", i.e. the politically acceptable range of thought. You just need to come out swinging and spitting facts about some topic.