Agreed. The Green Party sits on their ass until presidential election. They haven’t moved the needle. Best case scenario, they’ve convinced a few non-voters to participate. Worst case, they’re dishonest opportunists.
This angle also needs to be considered). She’s not running in good faith. She’s essentially functioning as a 5th column to pull away voters who would otherwise vote for Harris.
I’m not saying Harris shouldn’t be pushed on environmental issues. I am saying that trying to do that by voting for Stein is actively harmful to the goal of not letting the fascists win this election.
More importantly, if you are voting for her because of the environment, voting for stein is actually harmful to that goal because it helps trump win, which means instead of making baby steps in the right direction, we’ll run full steam in the wrong direction.
I would absolutely vote Green but to do so would be unthinkable until we have ranked choice voting. We should band all the leftists together for one big push to get that enacted everywhere. Once we do that we can go back to our divisive bickering.
The trouble with supporting a third party – and I say this as someone inclined to support a third party – is that anybody who actually does it is either (a) an idiot who doesn’t understand the game theory of first-past-the-post voting, or (b) an incredibly fringe nutjob. The result is that all third parties absolutely destroy all their credibility and ruin any chance of getting more mainstream.
If you’re a third-party-inclined person who isn’t an idiot or a nutjob, your only real option is to vote for Democrats in general, and ones who support ranked choice voting in particular (because you sure as Hell aren’t gonna get it from the Republicans), and then switch to your third party of choice only after ranked-choice voting is passed.
My state is nowhere near anywhere close to being a swing-state. My vote for president carries very little weight. For this reason, I vote for whichever party actually aligns with my ideology.
An acquaintance once tried to scapegoat me and my vote for Jill Stein as the reason that Donald Trump won in 2016.
If you live in a deep Red or deep Blue state, you definitely aren’t responsible for Donald Trump’s win in 2016, BUT we need to defeat Trump, and we need every vote we can get, everywhere we can get it, so Trump finds it hard to steal the election, because we know he will.
At least, if you live in California or Oklahoma, your nonsense vote won’t give us Trump, but unless you are CERTAIN you can throw your vote away, I’d ask you to look at your wife, sister, and/or mother and ask yourself if you want them subjected to Project 2025. If you don’t, and I hope you don’t, save the protest votes for your city/county/state governments where they might actually accomplish something.
Virtue signalling into the void. Don’t get me wrong, I did it too in 2012 because I was disillusioned with Obama and I live in a deeply blue state. But that’s all it is. You’re better off writing an encouraging letter to your candidate of choice, or talking to your neighbors about the city council, or any number of other things that might actually make a material impact on someone’s life.
It doesn’t do anything, but neither does voting for a Democratic president in a non-swing state. They could just leave the box blank too. They’re not choosing “should I check the president box or talk to my neighbors”, they’re at the voting booth, presumably because other races matter, and filling in the box because it’s there. None of the options in that race matter and the comment you’re replying to is explicitly about how it doesn’t matter, so why are you even complaining?
If you’re a third-party-inclined person who isn’t an idiot or a nutjob, your only real option is to vote for Democrats in general, and ones who support ranked choice voting in particular (because you sure as Hell aren’t gonna get it from the Republicans), and then switch to your third party of choice only after ranked-choice voting is passed.
The Democrats are going to give you ranked-choice voting so they can potentially lose your vote… Thank god you are not an idiot.
Maine and Alaska use RCV now, and while Alaskan politicians are trying to ratfuck the votes (because Sarah Palin lost to a Democrat under FPTP), both states have seen people not get a Republican thanks to their vote for Third Parties on the Left, as long as they at least grudgingly mark the Dem ahead of the Rep on the RCV ballot.
Colorado’s going to vote on this this November, too, which means I can actually vote Third Party without being ratfucked by that choice. Then I’ll happily say 'Vote Green to hold Blue accountable, but make sure Blue shows up before Red so Red doesn’t ratfuck all of us on the Left."
If you wonder about the constant use of ratfucking in my post, have a read and see what it means…
managed to do it without spoiling presidential elections with the support of Democrats and their donors. AOC backs them, they are a complete fake left organization to draw you in and accomplish nothing.
Across an entire nation, they have 140 whole offices. They have more people on their party organizing committee than people in office. None of those 140 are even at the level of state legislature, despite there being many races with unopposed Democrats that only have a few thousand total votes cast in them.
The last election for my state rep had 4,000 votes cast. He had a single opponent from a party I’ve never heard of who got 1,000 of them. There were more candidates running under that low name ID and sparesly funded local party than there were Green candidates. If they were a real party trying to advance progressive causes, this would be an ideal place to build local representation. Single-party state, tons of DINOs to challenge from the left, and low turnout that could make successful challenges possible.
Wow, 143 elected offices is massive. Such prestigious positions as “Neighborhood Council”, “Conservation District”, “Town Commission”, “Planning Group”, “Park Commission” (Pawnee reference??), “Select Board”, “Zoning Board of Appeals Alternate”, “Water District Board of Commissioners”, “School Committee”, “Advisory Neighborhood Commission”, and gasp what’s this? The mayor of a California town of 22,000 people? Why if all of them banded together and moved to Connecticut (and somehow became popular with the residents there), they could collectively make almost 77% of an entire Connecticut General Assembly and literally no other offices including mayorships, governorships, all of the other state legislatures and the federal legislature, and all the god-knows-how-many positions in local governments.
So now the goalposts are moved from they don’t do anything but presidential candidates to they don’t do enough? Maybe if they had better funding they could run more candidates. Saying they do nothing but presidential candidates is still disingenuous no matter how much you want to belittle their othet work.
Agreed. The Green Party sits on their ass until presidential election. They haven’t moved the needle. Best case scenario, they’ve convinced a few non-voters to participate. Worst case, they’re dishonest opportunists.
This angle also needs to be considered). She’s not running in good faith. She’s essentially functioning as a 5th column to pull away voters who would otherwise vote for Harris.
I’m not saying Harris shouldn’t be pushed on environmental issues. I am saying that trying to do that by voting for Stein is actively harmful to the goal of not letting the fascists win this election.
More importantly, if you are voting for her because of the environment, voting for stein is actually harmful to that goal because it helps trump win, which means instead of making baby steps in the right direction, we’ll run full steam in the wrong direction.
Fascists and Putin are sure to support her however they can. Cue the trolls.
Most of the greens here on Lemmy convinced me to never consider a green canidate.
I would absolutely vote Green but to do so would be unthinkable until we have ranked choice voting. We should band all the leftists together for one big push to get that enacted everywhere. Once we do that we can go back to our divisive bickering.
The trouble with supporting a third party – and I say this as someone inclined to support a third party – is that anybody who actually does it is either (a) an idiot who doesn’t understand the game theory of first-past-the-post voting, or (b) an incredibly fringe nutjob. The result is that all third parties absolutely destroy all their credibility and ruin any chance of getting more mainstream.
If you’re a third-party-inclined person who isn’t an idiot or a nutjob, your only real option is to vote for Democrats in general, and ones who support ranked choice voting in particular (because you sure as Hell aren’t gonna get it from the Republicans), and then switch to your third party of choice only after ranked-choice voting is passed.
My state is nowhere near anywhere close to being a swing-state. My vote for president carries very little weight. For this reason, I vote for whichever party actually aligns with my ideology.
An acquaintance once tried to scapegoat me and my vote for Jill Stein as the reason that Donald Trump won in 2016.
That’s not how the electoral college works.
If you live in a deep Red or deep Blue state, you definitely aren’t responsible for Donald Trump’s win in 2016, BUT we need to defeat Trump, and we need every vote we can get, everywhere we can get it, so Trump finds it hard to steal the election, because we know he will.
At least, if you live in California or Oklahoma, your nonsense vote won’t give us Trump, but unless you are CERTAIN you can throw your vote away, I’d ask you to look at your wife, sister, and/or mother and ask yourself if you want them subjected to Project 2025. If you don’t, and I hope you don’t, save the protest votes for your city/county/state governments where they might actually accomplish something.
Virtue signalling into the void. Don’t get me wrong, I did it too in 2012 because I was disillusioned with Obama and I live in a deeply blue state. But that’s all it is. You’re better off writing an encouraging letter to your candidate of choice, or talking to your neighbors about the city council, or any number of other things that might actually make a material impact on someone’s life.
It doesn’t do anything, but neither does voting for a Democratic president in a non-swing state. They could just leave the box blank too. They’re not choosing “should I check the president box or talk to my neighbors”, they’re at the voting booth, presumably because other races matter, and filling in the box because it’s there. None of the options in that race matter and the comment you’re replying to is explicitly about how it doesn’t matter, so why are you even complaining?
Your point is that doing something is more effective than doing nothing? You sure got me there. I have to say that I agree.
The Democrats are going to give you ranked-choice voting so they can potentially lose your vote… Thank god you are not an idiot.
San Francisco has ranked choice voting because there’s no way in hell a Republican could win here. That’s what we should be aiming for.
The Democrats give us nothing. We voters take.
Maine and Alaska use RCV now, and while Alaskan politicians are trying to ratfuck the votes (because Sarah Palin lost to a Democrat under FPTP), both states have seen people not get a Republican thanks to their vote for Third Parties on the Left, as long as they at least grudgingly mark the Dem ahead of the Rep on the RCV ballot.
Colorado’s going to vote on this this November, too, which means I can actually vote Third Party without being ratfucked by that choice. Then I’ll happily say 'Vote Green to hold Blue accountable, but make sure Blue shows up before Red so Red doesn’t ratfuck all of us on the Left."
If you wonder about the constant use of ratfucking in my post, have a read and see what it means…
Yes. That’s because the Democratic Party isn’t some monolithic machiavellian organization.
Libertarians == conservatives who smoke weed
Wrong. http://gpus.nationbuilder.com/officeholders
You’re the one sitting on your ass.
The DSA has far more electeds in every level of the government, and they’ve managed to do it without spoiling presidential elections. It’s easy, all you have to do is run through the Democratic Party primaries, they figured it out decades ago, curious that Jill Stein and the Greens somehow didn’t.
Democrats have you fooled.
Lmfao. You mean AOC who the DNC hates and has struggled for years to freeze out of the party? Seems like some small third party has you fooled.
Removed by mod
Says the person who thinks third parties are viable, would you like me to name the dozen socialist parties that have failed?
If you actually supported any of the policies that you claim, you would be working to make them viable instead of working against your own interests.
Saying this after saying to vote third party is certainly a pot calling kettle black moment.
They hold over 140 offices across 20 states. Seems a little disingenuous to claim that.
Across an entire nation, they have 140 whole offices. They have more people on their party organizing committee than people in office. None of those 140 are even at the level of state legislature, despite there being many races with unopposed Democrats that only have a few thousand total votes cast in them.
The last election for my state rep had 4,000 votes cast. He had a single opponent from a party I’ve never heard of who got 1,000 of them. There were more candidates running under that low name ID and sparesly funded local party than there were Green candidates. If they were a real party trying to advance progressive causes, this would be an ideal place to build local representation. Single-party state, tons of DINOs to challenge from the left, and low turnout that could make successful challenges possible.
That’s uhhh. A very interesting data point. Really kind of hangs the light on the problem…
Wow, 143 elected offices is massive. Such prestigious positions as “Neighborhood Council”, “Conservation District”, “Town Commission”, “Planning Group”, “Park Commission” (Pawnee reference??), “Select Board”, “Zoning Board of Appeals Alternate”, “Water District Board of Commissioners”, “School Committee”, “Advisory Neighborhood Commission”, and gasp what’s this? The mayor of a California town of 22,000 people? Why if all of them banded together and moved to Connecticut (and somehow became popular with the residents there), they could collectively make almost 77% of an entire Connecticut General Assembly and literally no other offices including mayorships, governorships, all of the other state legislatures and the federal legislature, and all the god-knows-how-many positions in local governments.
So now the goalposts are moved from they don’t do anything but presidential candidates to they don’t do enough? Maybe if they had better funding they could run more candidates. Saying they do nothing but presidential candidates is still disingenuous no matter how much you want to belittle their othet work.
That’s a drop of LSD in a lake.