• acargitz
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    2 months ago

    I don’t understand why it is taken for granted that if Stein wasn’t a candidate the people who vote for her would be voting for the Democrats instead. Just as likely they would not vote at all or vote for some other protest candidate.

      • KillingTimeItself
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        2 months ago

        The spoiler candidate logic has always been sketchy.

        it depends on how popular third party is. If they’re getting 20-30% of the vote but no more it’s extremely common for them to drop out to support the primary instead.

        Anything lower than 10% and it probably doesn’t matter much. RFK jr is a decent exmaple of this, although he was more “bipartisan” in terms of support, apparently.

        • @[email protected]
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          72 months ago

          The last US Presidential election decided with more than a 10% margin was Regan. The only vote with above a 5% margin this millennium was Obama’s first term.

          “Anything lower than 10% and it probably doesn’t matter much” is a weird take.

          • @[email protected]
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            82 months ago

            As in that’s such a small group they are probably more dedicated to their candidate and won’t vote for anyone else.

            Again. You can’t expect to remove candidates from a ballot and their support will all just vote Democrat. It’s a false logic to assume they belong to anywhere else other than their vote block.
            When you have a large base that small percentage that’s willing to vote off base ends up being a larger percentage of the vote overall as well.

            Currently you would have to get every single last green party voter to give up and vote Blue which is an impossible ask. So even at 5% of the vote I’m not sure they could swing an election with enough if their candidate asked nicely.
            They went high with their estimate though.

            • KillingTimeItself
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              2 months ago

              yeah, my 10% figure was probably generous, but i think i would probably stand by it in most cases, as unless you’re polling 20% at bare minimum you’re probably dropping out of primaries anyway out of fears of “siphoning” votes. Realistically the outcome between the two alternatives here is probably marginal, if at all.

          • KillingTimeItself
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            2 months ago

            this is assuming that the voter split isn’t roughly at random. Jill stein is running on either extremely far left anti war sentiment, which we see among the right as well, along with cozying up to russia apparently, which only tankies and farther right people want.

            That alone is pretty mixed.

            Generally unless the candidate is going to pull a large enough share of the votes to the point where it enact a significant draw from the candidate hence my 20-30% figure, it really won’t do anything to the voter turnout. Like i said, as we saw with RFK, it was roughly split down the middle.

            Jill stein might pull more far lefties, but that’s only because they refuse to vote in their best interest lmao. They wouldn’t vote anyway.

            • @[email protected]
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              42 months ago

              Conservative voters are not anti-war, they are anti-Russian war, and the Republican ticket already addresses that. These people don’t historically vote for left wing parties, nor are they in this case.

              The green party’s base is pot smokers and college students who haven’t gotten wise to the green grift yet.

              • KillingTimeItself
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                12 months ago

                Conservative voters are not anti-war, they are anti-Russian war, and the Republican ticket already addresses that. These people don’t historically vote for left wing parties, nor are they in this case.

                it depends. Some of them are anti-war because they’re isolationist, and they don’t want to be a part of the ongoing global politics thingy. Some of them as you said, are anti russian war, which is absolutely true. A lot of these same republicans also support israel, although that might be construed differently since they are technically an ally of the US. But that is pretty the case there.

                The green party’s base is pot smokers and college students who haven’t gotten wise to the green grift yet.

                it’s either stupid people who don’t know anything about politics, or people who think the green party is a real political party lol.

    • @[email protected]
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      72 months ago

      Because people who are disillusioned that the green party would address their concerns are generally not complete shitheads like republicans; they’re decent but misled people.

      • @[email protected]
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        22 months ago

        Voting for genocide will never be something you can convince humans is in their best interest as close to their preferred ideology.

        • @[email protected]
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          32 months ago

          Genocide is bad. Multiple genocides, and faster, is worse. One genocide is closer to my preferred ideology of zero genocides than that same genocide but worse, plus additional genocides. The only people who are unconvinced by that arithmetic are idealists who care more about maintaining their ideological purity than actually helping people.

          • @[email protected]
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            12 months ago

            I’m not voting for any genocide, sorry. It sucks you have no red line, no limit to your loyalty, no bottom depth to your depravity you willingly vote for, but I have a simple one:

            No genocide.

            Until the US stops contributing soft power, arms, cash, and troops on the ground to a genocide, the people in exclusive control of that don’t get my vote.

            • @[email protected]
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              32 months ago

              You have a fundamental misunderstanding of how voting works, mechanically, in a FPTP system. You don’t vote for things. You vote against them.

              Once RCV takes hold (thank your local and state representatives) I’ll be right there beside you voting my conscience. Until then, that’s not a productive strategy. It does not achieve the intended goal.

              Lesser evil buys time. Vote for progressives on your state ballots. If there aren’t any, vote for progressives on your local ballots. If there aren’t any, run for local office as a progressive.

              • @[email protected]
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                12 months ago

                You’ve been voting the lesser evil for 80 years, does it feel like it’s bought you time?

                I’m not voting for genocide, in voting against it, hence why I’m not voting for Dems or Reps.

                • @[email protected]
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                  2 months ago

                  Sounds like you’re voting hard in favor of worse genocide. Either that or basic logic isn’t your strong suit and you’re doing it unknowingly

                  • @[email protected]
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                    12 months ago

                    “worse genocide” do you people actually read what you type?

                    Say that out loud to yourself. That you are voting for less genocide instead of no genocide, and then tell me you’re still the good guy.

                • @[email protected]
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                  32 months ago

                  You’ve been voting the lesser evil for 80 years, does it feel like it’s bought you time?

                  Unequivocally yes. Imagine if the right wing clinched power in 1944 and never lost traction. You think civil rights would be better?

                  I’m not voting for genocide, in voting against it, hence why I’m not voting for Dems or Reps.

                  What’s that accomplished in the last 80 years?

                  • @[email protected]
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                    12 months ago

                    The right wing did clinch power in 1944, hence the dramatic stop to progressive legislation.

        • @aubeynarf
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          2 months ago

          The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Voting for a fringe-left party rather than Democrats increases the chance, and represents direct personal action leading to, a worse outcome for Palestinians.

          • @[email protected]
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            12 months ago

            Palestinians seems to think otherwise, I’ll follow their lead. I was going to vote for the Palestinian candidate directly but I’ll be honest, PSL is better for the world than green.