this post was submitted on 24 May 2024
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Because one stands a chance of winning, the other does not.
whichever side we support stands a chance of winning. They aint gonna compete in a game of skill in November, they're gonna ask us who wins and we decide.
Yes, "we", consisting of statistically significant factions of the voting population. Campaigns take time and money, neither of which any candidates besides the two front-runners have enough of to be competitive. They're not gonna ask you who wins, you don't decide. I don't see 70 million Americans shifting to anyone else at this stage.
you've got a paradox going where me supporting a better candidate is pointless because my vote is worth nothing and I cant change anything.
but also that I have to support your candidate because my vote matters if its for them.
my vote matters and I'm giving it to a better candidate.
Is it a paradox to say that driving in circles around a roundabout is pointless because it doesn't get you anywhere, but driving along the route to a destination does? Driving is driving, does it work or not? Paradox! Smearing food on your belly doesn't satisfy your hunger, but eating it does. Does food satisfy hunger or not? Paradox!
If we had approval or ranked choice voting, voting third party would accomplish something. Since we have First Past the Past elections, voting third party is as effective as smearing food on your belly or circling a roundabout for hours.
Its pretty irritating everytime someone brings up ranked choice voting. They know its a good thing, they want it to happen. But its getting brought up to try and criticize my choice of candidate. You want ranked choice voting? You know who supports ranked choice voting in their election platform? My candidate! I am well aware of how shit FPTP voting is, Im not the one promoting it.
I'm not promoting it either, that doesn't change the fact that it is what we use. Voting for a candidate that supports RCV doesn't basically mean that the election you voted for them in becomes retroactively RCV, you act based on what the system is, not what it should be.
You are promoting it with your vote for candidates that support it, that are only in power because it exists.
That's not how the system works. All voting third party does is equivocate approval for the two front runners. Do you approve of the insurrectionist fascist and the neo-liberal equally? Are they exactly the same to you? Do you think they are equally supportive of election reform?
The fascists with minority support only have power because kids who don't understand the electoral system either abstain from voting, or vote third party. If everyone held their nose and showed up to vote lesser evil, the Republican party would wither away into being a third party themselves and a progressive party could actually gain footing.
Your candidate doesn't stand a chance precisely because people like you keep pretending the system works differently.
Hows that goin for ya? Making any progress in the decades you've been trying that for? 'If everyone just did this', yeah? How about if everyone just voted for the candidate that supports ranked choice? Just get everyone to do X.
Pretty well actually, considering the glacial pace inherent to changing a political landscape. It's made it onto the ballot in several states, and is used several local and state-wide elections here and there. The Fair Representation Act has been brought to th the floor in 2017, 2019, 2021, and again this year but it hasn't been voted on yet.
How's that going for ya? Elected a third party candidate to the presidency yet?
so Im looking into states that have implemented this, to see if electing democrats had anything to do with it. Looking at Alaska and Maine at least, democrats had nothing to do with it, they were citizen initiatives brought to election referendum, neither democrats or republican representatives introduced or voted on it. Notably, the Alaska state legislature has more republican members than democrats.
I think you missed my point of us being in the same boat. You're not likely to get enough people to vote for people they dont like to crowd out republicans in Washington, and Im not likely to get enough people to vote for people they would otherwise love with a D or R by their name.
The Fair Representation Act has been sponsored by a Democrat every time.
It's orders of magnitude more probable to get the slim minority you're talking about to align D than it is to get the overwhelming majority I'm talking about to rally behind the same third party candidate. It's not even worth comparing, the concept is laughable at best. To even hint at that happening this election is bordering on clinical levels of delusion.
If you want to campaign for your candidate next cycle, be my guest. Start early, organize, fundraise and get the message out. Next cycle. This cycle, you're dividing the anti-Project-2025 voting bloc. This cycle, you run the very real risk of ensuring there is no next cycle. Remember that.
Yes, a democrat, with single digit cosponsors out of hundreds of democrats in a democrat controlled house the last time it was brought up. If the democratic party wanted ranked choice voting, we would have ranked choice voting now. the democrat controlled house didnt even bring it up for a vote. That's the thing, it's republicans=conservative and democrats=progressive for you, but a large number of democrats are conservative to me. I dont think a fully democrat controlled congress passes ranked choice voting. I dont think they pass lobbying reform. Hell there are democrats that still vote against minimum wage increases. I dont think a fully democrat controlled government looks much different from the one today.
What's gonna be different next cycle? You think Trump's going away? You'll be right here again in 2028 telling me democracy is at stake if I dont vote for your choice.
Don't forget that it's not ok to vote for your candidate because they don't already have enough support, therefore there's no way to ever reach the threshold where it'll be ok to vote for them.
It's only ok to vote for the neolibs that the billionaires approve after a promise that nothing's really going to change.
Even in a state that's so blue the Dems have no chance of losing, voting for or writing in someone left of the incumbent will still be deemed a vote for the red team.