I never vote for anyone running unopposed. This sends a signal that I’m not happy with the (lack of) choice I am given. Maybe it prompts someone else to run against them in the future.
As a hijack in my own thread. But we are talking about the Insurrection and Trump won in 2020 meme.
I heard an interview Trump gave talking about Dr. Oz. Part of it went like this:
Trump: If we won in 2020 …
Trump: pause You could here the “Oh Shit!” in the silence
Trump: and we did win.
HA!!! You know you really lost!!!
Remember those happy, happy days when that was just a joke?
And even when they hear it from people who have, in fact, been bankrupt 100 times over, they still listen.
I’ll say that I get what you are saying, regarding your local area being 100% R, so that your only real choice is “which R candidate?”
For a long while, I was in a solid D area of Los Angeles and the only R candidates were definitely sacrificial lambs. It seems they just rotated the R candidacy among their half a dozen party members.
So, what to do? ISTM that it involves more than just voting. Volunteer on the campaign for your preferred candidate. Work the phones, knock on doors, do fund raising. It’s all of the boots on the ground efforts that need to be done to win.
The unfortunate fact is, at the national level, even moderates who win congressional seats have to tow the line as loyal foot soldiers for the party leaders. So, you may avoid sending a more colorful personality to congress, but the party line congressional votes will be the same.
And how is that strategy working out for you?
For me, I have helped to keep one crazy QANON supporter off of the local school board by voting against her in the primary. She was only short a couple dozen votes.
Damn, you’re right. In fact it was him that got me being more impressed with the Dems. Stupid aging brain . . .
I should also make clear I never voted for Reagan. First time I voted for 3rd party candidate and liberal Republican John Anderson. Next time I was on call, stuck in hospital, and not really burning to vote for either candidate, though I favored Mondale. The only presidential election I missed since I was eligible.
The problem is, whatever you do, you have to do it quietly, or else you’re at risk of having your house firebombed by the people who are now the political party to which you claim primary allegiance.
We will see in 4 days
I not only voted for Reagan, I campaigned for him in 1984 as a Young Republican. My odyssey from that to Campaigning for Obama is somewhat abnormal I think.
Is this school board candidate heavily supported by the Republican Party in your area? If so, then you are attempting to correct the course of your party, but if this is just some loner nutjob then you are still just playing it safe when it comes to your party politics.
I’m curious-what’s your beef with her? Feel free to not answer.
Who are you talking about?
It’s especially convincing if, as so many are, they are already up to their necks in debt. Fear, shame, guilt, and anger make for real ugly, irrational political positions that some politicians are only too happy to exploit for their own ends.
So, when the crazy-ass candidates win the primary anyway, do you hold your nose and vote for them because you think even a crazy-ass Republican is better than a Democrat?
If you don’t, we’re good…..whether or not you vote Democrat or just stay home or don’t vote in those particular races. But if you’re voting for the crazy-ass candidates in general…..you and those like you ARE the problem.
ETA: I understand that in some deep red or deep blue areas, there is a logical reason to register with the dominant party regardless of your political beliefs, because so many races are effectively decided in the primary. I lived in a deep blue district for years and understand that dynamic.
I imagine you voted against Trump twice. If you’re not voting for the Republican president and you won’t vote for most Reps and Sens (unless they are Maxine Waters), you’re not really a Republican.
I’ll ask you the same question that I ask my sister, who makes her living raising money for the RNC: why is the imaginary fiscal responsibility of the Republican party more important to you than social progressiveness or social justice? Maybe, just maybe, it would be tolerable to choose that fairness and justice for minorities, an expansion of human rights to all people, and avoiding the expansion of a theorcracy is a bit more important than pretending somehow Republicans are better at spending tax money than Democrats.
It sounds to me that you’re not really a Republican, you’re just Anti-Democrat.
This sentence reminded me of an interview a reporter had with Javits. They asked him how someone with his views could be a Republican. His answer was that he didn’t want to be in the same party as Herman Talmadge. Guess what? Talmadge ended up in the Republican party. It was no longer Javits’s Republican party and has become more and more extreme ever since. Nixon, then Reagan, then Gingrich, …, downhill all the way.
Getting back to the OP, just look at Wyoming and tell me how you can possibly make a difference if Liz Cheney can’t.
Not if you live in Missouri. In the primary race for the Senate, ALL the candidates are falling all over themselves declaring their love for Donald Trump in particular and MAGA in general. John Danforth, the last living “moderate” Republican in the state, has been trying to convince January 6th investigator John Wood to run as an independent - under the romantic notion that with a dozen candidates splitting the pro-Trump vote, a non-Trump candidate still couldn’t win as a Republican, but could somehow charm enough Democrats to join moderate Republicans and win the seat.
FWIW, as a former Republican (now a Democrat-supporting Independent), I don’t agree with all of the Dems’ social justice / progress stuff, but the fact that “fiscal responsibility” is truly just an imaginary GOP position and not a real one, helped serve as one of a decently large group of issues that caused me to leave the party.
Republican Presidents post-Nixon have generally had a terrible record of fiscal responsibility–largely because I think the Presidency lends itself exactly to the sort of thinking where fiscal responsibility isn’t important. However, there was a genuine fiscal conservatism in the Republican House and Senate caucuses at least until the 2010s or so, they weren’t often able to win the day, but they did exist.
Incidents like fucking around with the debt limit nailed in the coffin for me any idea that the GOP’s politicians care at all about the fiscal health of the country. There is no party that meaningfully cares about fiscal responsibility in the United States, so that to me isn’t really a relevant political position on which to base votes.