Just because someone presents something as if there are a limited number of possibilities or outcomes, its important to keep in mind, this is often just a result of their framing. Its often more reflective of their incomplete thinking on a situation than it is reality, and cynically, its a kind of rhetorical slight of hand often used to keep a narrative structured in such a way that only certain outcomes are possible.
Democrats, and more importantly, their voters, have proven to be cowards in the face of doing the right thing. Demanding little and less from a party as weak as the Democrats has left a lane wide open. I think we’ll see that lane taken over the next couple of years.
Let me frame it this way then… in my lifetime, more electoral college votes have been awarded ACCIDENTALLY than have been won by a third party. That’s an absolute fact:
https://www.minnpost.com/politics-policy/2016/12/enduring-mystery-america-s-last-faithless-elector/
The best shot a 3rd party had was with Ross Perot in 1992, how did that work out?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_United_States_presidential_election
Clinton - 44,909,889 - 43.0% - 370 EC
Bush - 39,104,550 - 37.4% - 168
Perot - 19,743,821 - 18.9% - 0
No other 3rd party run has even been close.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_United_States_presidential_election
Clinton - 47,401,185 - 49.2% - 379
Dole - 39,197,469 - 40.7% - 159
Perot - 8,085,294 - 8.4% - 0
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_United_States_presidential_election
Reagan - 43,903,230 - 50.7% - 489
Carter - 35,481,115 - 41.0% - 49
Anderson - 5,719,850 - 6.6% - 0
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000_United_States_presidential_election
Bush - 50,456,002 - 47.9% - 271*
Gore - 50,999,897 - 48.4% - 266*
Nader - 2,882,955 - 2.74% - 0
* It was found, after Bush’s inauguration, that any correct re-counting of Florida would have awarded it to Gore.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/jan/29/uselections2000.usa
Perot in 1992 is what really drives home the point. He got nearly 20% of the popular vote but ZERO electoral college votes. Voting 3rd party simply isn’t reasonable given our current system.
Voting is like public transportation, get on the train going the direction that you want. In the off years work to make changes and organize, most people ignore the second part.
I like the bus analogy. You aren’t getting door to door service. You take the bus that gets you closest to your destination and put in the work to walk the rest of the way.
The Democratic bus gets you within a mile.
The Republican bus travels through the Twilight Zone and strands you in a post apocalyptic wasteland.
In the off years work to make changes and organize, most people ignore the second part.
And for some strange reason, some of the regular commenters here actively oppose this part in favor of telling us the solution is to let the GOP gain power and “send a message to the Democrats”.
Voting is like public transportation, get on the train going the direction that you want.
I hate this. It presupposes that the two trains are heading in different directions. They’re both headed to the same destination. One is an express train.
Plus it’s glib.
Do you have a point you think you are making in regurgitating this? If so spit it out. Something I’ve seen repeatedly on lemmy is people for whom some answer, some framing is acceptable, being completely incapable of understanding that there are people for whom that framing isn’t acceptable. Also, to be clear, we’re talking about a congress-critter, not the big house in this article. Since thats the topic of the article, it would be appropriate to keep the discussion focused. The reality is that it doesn’t matter how small world your view of this matter is: there are other people in the world who think differently than you, and if you want to actually convince them, these tired tropes wont work.
My argument, is that Democrats have left a lane wide open, and from a purely strategic/ cynical view of things, it would be stupid for some-one/ anyone to not just hop in and take that lane. I think we see Talib, Omar, maybe Porter, any other progressives who’ve been ratfucked by the DNC/ DCCC take that lane as independents. Its a blue ocean/ wide open opportunity that rarely shows itself in politics.
The point is, the winner of our elections will be either the Democrat or the Republican. There is no viable 3rd choice.
So, you hold your nose and vote for whoever is closest to your view who will actually get elected to prevent the person farthest from your view from taking office.
And don’t give me that bullshit about “well, neither one is close to my view” because if Gore won in 2000 we wouldn’t have been attacked on 9/11 and burned trillions in Iraq and Afghanistan, and if Clinton had won in 2016, we wouldn’t have a packed right wing Supreme Court and lost Roe.
Both sides are NOT the same, one is CLEARLY better than the other for you and everyone else.