this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2024
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United States | News & Politics

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (5 children)

Hilarious. Let me think about who I'd vote for if I was US-American. The Fascist or the at least slightly socially progressive neoliberals? It's anyone's guess really. NO. Of course the Dems, fucking obviously.

So if I was US-American and also hit in the head enough to consider voting for third party in a country with a first-past-the-post boring system, I'd not vote for the Dems as a result.

This is called the spoiler effect. This makes her a spoiler candidate, no matter her intention.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 months ago (4 children)

I fucking hate this rhetoric.

Voting for a third party is not "taking a vote away" from anyone.

You're arguing with someone who would in all likelihood JUST NOT VOTE if not for an alternative option. If you want assurances that fascism doesn't get voted in, how about you direct that passion towards getting people to vote for someone, anyone, instead of staying at home? That is the only certain way of getting not-the-GOP-candidate elected time and time again. Republicans always come out to vote in about the same numbers every election. Just get more people voting, and not only do the Dem numbers go up, but the viability of a third party goes up astronomically as well.

Just VOTE. For anyone!

[–] [email protected] -4 points 2 months ago

Hate it all you want, it's objective reality.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago (40 children)

The Fascist or the at least slightly socially progressive neoliberals

Neither are acceptable, both are genocidal regimes that are working towards WW3, Climate Collapse, and genocide. The only peaceful solution is voting third party, otherwise revolution is necessary. Taking the miniscule chance of a peaceful solution is morally correct, especially if we believe revolution to be necessary.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Meanwhile you “peacefully” increase the probability that the guy who destroyed women's reproductive rights gets voted in again.

I say you should help punish the Republicans for MAGA and once they try a moderate candidate again you can vote third party. But don't ignore the consequences of your actions.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Meanwhile you “peacefully” increase the probability that the guy who destroyed women's reproductive rights gets voted in again.

Meanwhile you "peacefully" increase the probability that genocide continues, climate change continues to be ignored, and World War 3 kills us all.

I say you should help punish the Republicans for MAGA and once they try a moderate candidate again you can vote third party. But don't ignore the consequences of your actions.

What do you think fascism is? Why do you think MAGA is just a random event and not a systemic problem? Fascism is Capitalism in decline, there will be no "moderate" candidates because Capitalism is still in decline. The conditions for fascism persist, so fascism persists, and the Dems get closer to fascism.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I'm not doing anything like that, the will never be public support for a socialist candidate in the US without first changing the voting system.

I wish it wasn't like that but I'm convinced it is.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)
  1. Why do you believe there will never be public support for a Socialist candidate in the US? Where do you believe people draw their ideas from? Is the US a static, unchanging system? We know this to be false, wealth disparity is rising, the climate is changing, it's anything but static!

  2. The mainstream parties will never risk losing power intentionally, ergo there will be no change to the voting system.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Because that's how the spoiler effect works.The more support a leftist third party gets, the easier it is for the Republicans to win.

I can't tell you how to fix it, but I can tell you that an election with 10% Socialists, 40% Dems, and 50% Reps will scare people away from voting Socialists.

At least as long as MAGA is a thing and the Dems aren't seen as totally corrupt and basically the same as the Reps by the general public. And believe me: they aren't.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

You didn't answer my questions. Why do you believe the US is a closed, unchanging, static system? In order for any of your analysis to make any sense, it must be immovable with no trends in metrics, in perpetuity.

Because that's how the spoiler effect works.The more support a leftist third party gets, the easier it is for the Republicans to win.

Not necessarily. Ideas change alongside the ever-changing material conditions.

I can't tell you how to fix it

Evidently.

but I can tell you that an election with 10% Socialists, 40% Dems, and 50% Reps will scare people away from voting Socialists.

Why? Trends change over time.

At least as long as MAGA is a thing

It will be for as long as Capitalism exists, getting worse. Capitalism is declining, and fascism rises when Capitalism is in decay. Only Socialism will fix it, liberalism leads to more fascism. You can't prevent MAGA by voting Dem, you strengthen it.

and the Dems aren't seen as totally corrupt and basically the same as the Reps by the general public

This is increasingly proven to be true, public opinion of both parties is declining.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

So I don't have a hat in this race because I can not vote. I think you have a fundamental misunderstanding about how a government is formed in the United States. The odds of stopping a Democrat or Republican from not winning the 2024 presidential election are futile. If I could vote, but I can't, if I voted third party I would be putting my effort into what I know is a futile effort. That seems morally the same as ignoring it because I know the results would be identical. The only moral option I would then have is to choose the least bad option. The most moral option would be off the table for me.

Actually the president used to be less important than they seemed. The United States Supreme Court decision that president's are practically kings changes a lot. ~~The other side of this is that the president doesn't really matter. The president really only executes the will of Congress.~~ It seems to me that if you really wanted to do the moral thing, it would be changing the roots of the problem. Not a single branch. It's the hearts and minds of grass roots organizationa you want to change long before anyone walks up to a polling booth.

Just saying, as someone who can't vote.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago (1 children)

First off, I understand how the electoral system works. The odds are incredibly slim that a third party will win. I disagree that a Democrat victory is acceptable, because the Democrats will only push for more genocide, failed climate action, and world war 3. It isn't a matter of being "better or worse," both result in the doom of humanity. Either we push to end that electorally, or via revolution.

Organizing is also good, Claudia De La Crúz represents PSL, a party that does that more than try to win the presidency. They serve to highlight the sham of the election and gain recognition.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

I wish I could tell you more because my area did that, we've done what we both agree is what needs to happen. We elected a third party candidate as our representative. Not as our president, that's insane lol. Also I don't know how what we did would apply to the United States other than just saying grass roots organizing. Saying even that much reveals more about me than I'm comfortable with online.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

least slightly socially progressive neoliberals? It’s anyone’s guess really. NO. Of course the Dems, fucking obviously.

What are they actually socially progressive on though? They're still supporting ICE and police state expansion, still doing tough on immigration bullshit, still presiding over migrant concentration camps, still funding and arming Israeli genocide, still rattling the saber at China, still blockading Cuba, not doing anything to protect trans people from genocide, doing exterminationist shit to homeless people in blue cities in blue states,

I could go on but you get the point.

Putting a HRC sticker on doesn't mean you're a little bit socially progressive, it means you have a PR team.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

The fact that you are not american, and apparently do not understand our political system, means that you probably shouldn't be talking about our elections. There's only around 10 states at any given time that actually decide the outcome of a presidential election, by design, and the rest of the states are pretty well locked in, most especially the majority population centers like new york, california, texas, many southern states, cascadia. It's only realistically medium density states, flooded with suburbs, that are really up for grabs in the EC, which doesn't necessarily directly correlate with who becomes president. Every state, bubbling from local city districts, to state level districts, are also gerrymandered to shit, which further decreases the power of your vote directly.

So, if you live in one of those majority population cities or states, your vote basically might as well just be going straight into the paper shredder. You might as well vote for a third party, which, given 5% of the popular vote, could qualify them for federal funding, you might as well vote for a third party to signal to the big two parties in which direction they should lean, you might as well vote for a third party so said third party can understand what their actual activist base is.

Doubly so when we have further evidence that the marketing of either party doesn't matter so much when they agree on every other issue regarding their actual political orientation. On economics, they're both neoliberals. On immigration, they're both hitting the same line because the only institutional response to the exploitation of latin america and the climate crisis has been to shore up the border militarily. On foreign policy, they are both completely aligned. On social issues, they might seem a little bit different, but I think you'll find that nobody in the democratic party really takes what is mostly used as an aesthetic ideological divergence seriously, or else they would actually be pulling any number of the levers available to substantially change things. Gay marriage might be legal at the federal level, sure, but see what kamala's record is as the DA of san francisco, and it's pretty fucking horrifying, and is obviously something that we know impacts marginalized communities to a greater degree.

Also don't hit me with the "oh she was secretly good as the DA". She was incredibly mid as the DA compared to every other "progressive" DA that san francisco has had, which is an incredibly low bar to still somehow not clear. One side will hit you with "kamala had 2,000 people locked up for marijuana charges", which is true because when you are arrested you go to jail for sometimes months or even years until trial, most especially when prisons are crowded with marijuana charges or graffiti charges, and then the opposition claps back with "well she only sent 45 people to state prison, which is less than the last guy for state prisons", despite the fact we have no information for county jails because they refuse to give us those statistics. That's on top of her deciding to prosecute parents for truancy, which I'm sure can be spun as actually being a good thing rather than a ghoulish curb-stomping of the working class which just needs to buck up and bootstrap themselves under the gentle threat of getting sent to jail, which I'm sure will help kids. I have a lot more then just that, too, and I can hit you with the citations if you actually want to read them. That's just her, also, a lot of this shit will float around about basically every other "progressive" democratic politician except for maybe bernie, AOC and other members of the squad, and maybe some midwestern politicians that happen to get a simple democratic majority.