Well, so much for voting this November.

The BBQ Pit
41

Olentzero, you are only serivng to hel bush. Every vote you draw from Kerry helps ensure Bush’s election.

It does not matter how far left you believe yourself to be, it doesn’t matter how pure your motives may be–the net effect of your actions is to keep Bush in office. Don’t hand me “But Gore lost his home state,” or “but Gore ran a bad campaign”; that may be so, but that does not absolve you and the other loony leftists from your guilt for siphoning votes from the Democrats, especially in florida. If the Nader vote in Florida had gone to Gore
[ul]
[li]We would not be in Iraq[/li][li]500 American soldiers and many more Iraqis would still be alive[/li][li]9/11 might have been stopped by foloing the plan Clinton had drawn up to smash Al Qaeda[/li][li]Environmental laws would not be unenforced[/li][li]Insane, budget-busting tax cuts would not have been passed[/li][/ul]
and on and on and on. I don’t want to hear one bit of blame on anyone else because when it was YOUR turn to help defeat Bush, you screwed up and threw away your vote on Nader. You wantd to turn the Dems leftward? Well, you failed, and all you did was put that moronic redneck bullshit artitst and his henchmen into the White House.
And if you cannot see the difference between the Democrats and the GOP right now, then maybe you shouldn’t vote because you’re not informed enough to do so responsibly.

Hell, just join the GOP and cut out the middle man, since that’s all your electoral efforts will ever amount to.

42

But isn’t that the sort of thing Bush himself says, Gobear? If you ain’t fer us, you’re aggin us.

43

If Kerry’d promise to do exactly that—nothing—he’d have my vote.

Well, I dunno that I make it sound like anything except what a literal reading would sound like. That would be all households owning any stock, so I guess you’re included. RTF said “shareholder class;” I figgered that meant people who owned shares of stock, the same literal translation I’ve used. If it’s something else he’s talking about, then I guess we should let him define that. Along with “typical American.” A little specificity is in order, I believe.

While we’re at it, Olentzero, perhaps you could define a couple of your terms, too. Like “working class,” and “my class.”

44

I’m not concerned about the history of the Democratic party, at least not rightnow; I’m only concerned about what we can expect them to do in the immediate future if they gain power.

What do you mean, “would be”? Do you have the remotest concern about whether this person has a chance at getting into power? If not, why not vote for Leon Trotsky? I mean, c’mon, he and Nader have about the same chance of getting elected president of the United States.

Listen. I voted for Nader twice. In 1996, I was thoroughly disillusioned with Clinton and didn’t see him as functionally different from Dole. In 2000, Gore ran a Republican Lite campaign, Nader had a chance to achieve 5% of votes (thereby making the Green Party the major third party in the US and subtly changing our election dynamics), and I knew that Gore didn’t stand a chance in North Carolina.

But in 2004, there’s no practical reason for a progressive to vote for Nader. Hell, it doesn’t sound like Nader himself will vote for Nader:

Do you still not get it? WE WON in 2000! The Democratic party has learned its lesson! Lieberman isn’t the candidate, and Gore isn’t the Candidate. We’ve got a fairly progressive candidate running for office in the Democratic party, more progressive than any party candidate in the last decade, and he’s gonna fight.

Is he Trotsky? No. Sweeny, Guevara, Chavez? No, he’s not, I’ll grant you that. But he’s not going to fuck the working class like Bush will.

I’m gonna tweak your analogy, too. You’re a rabbi, okay? And some dude is telling you, “For the next four years, I’m either going to feed your congregation a daily meal of pork sandwiches, or strychnine sandwiches. If you want, you can choose which.” And if you, the rabbi, are too self-righteous to choose the pork sandwiches, it’s your congregation that’s going to suffer.

Life doesn’t always hand us good decisions. We gotta do the best we can with the hand we’re dealt.

Daniel

45

To turn around: that’s too freakin’ bad, gobear, because there’s plenty of blame to spread around. Gore, who ran such a repulsively Republican Lite campaign, alienated plenty of voters, thereby stealing the election for Bush. Many alienated voters stayed home based on Gore’s uninspiring nonmessage, thereby stealing the election for Bush. The socialist candidate got more votes than the difference between Gore and Bush in Florida, thereby stealing the election for Bush. Election boards incorrectly denied many black voters the chance to vote, thereby stealing the election for Bush. And, of course, let’s not forget the conspiracy between the Bushes to steal the election for Bush, and the assistance they got from five assholes in DC.

Too many Democrats, yourself included, hate to admit their own culpability in the last election, and so they say, “lalalalalala!” when confronted with evidence of the many reasons that Gore lost. As long as you Democrats refuse to take responsibility for Gore’s lackluster campaign, you’re likely to repeat the mistakes again. When you realize that you can’t win an election by being “Like the Republicans, only less so,” you’ll have a chance.

Near as I can tell, Dean got it, and Kerry’s getting it. Don’t undermine his advances.

Daniel

46

Whoa! gobear’s a Democrat?!

Have you been reading the same message board I’ve been reading, LHoD?

47

askeptic recently accused rjung of being a Bushista, and I was just trying to right the cosmic balance.

Geez. Try to even out a little karma, and people jump down your throat.

Daniel

48

Ahem, I said nothing of the sort. If you want to attain a goal (in this case, defeating Bush), then you must not be distracted by less important issues that actually make it less likely for you to attain your goal.

LHoD:

I freely admit the weakness of Gore’s campaign (although I think “Republican Lite” is an inaccurate description of his platform), but the point is that when it was time for Olentzero to step up and do his part, he ended up throwing support to Bush by weakening Gore. Gore’s mistakes indeed cost him dearly, but that doesn’t mean that Olentzero does not bear some culpability for Bush’s victory (well, mostly the Supreme Court does, but still. . . )

JayJay, while it is true that I’m a fiscal conservative and a proponet of a strong military, as a gay man, I have to vote Democrat. Unlike the Log Cabin queens, I have a conscience as well as a wallet, and supporting the GOP as it is currently constituted is voting for everything I despise.

49

Okay, I can agree a bit with that, specifically, with the “some culpability” phrase. What chaps my ass is Democrats who want to ignore the beam in Gore’s eye to focus on the splinter in the eye of the Naders. Any number of parties could have acted differently in 2000 and gotten us a much better president; anyone who acted poorly that year has no higher ground from which to attack anyone else who acted poorly.

Especially not since our opposition is so freakish in their Borglike unity*. I’m assuming none of us want to hang separately, so we need to straighten up pronto.

Daniel

*character assassination put in for IzzyR’s sake.

50

Ah, but who one votes for is a pragmatic decision, and doesn’t necessarily define which Party (if any) your principles and beliefs align with. While you may vote Democrat, I think I can safely say (from having read your posts over the last 3 1/2 years) that you are definitely not one. Neither do I believe that you are a Republican (and didn’t believe that even before that Party followed Dubya over the deficit-spending cliff), which I hope wasn’t the impression my post above gave. I’ve always seen you as a little-l libertarian more than anything.

It was just a shock to see someone who’s been around long enough to have read even a small part of your posting history call you a Democrat!

51

In my opinion, that goal would be more likely attained if the Democrats merely worked on their PR. Each side sees the other side as clueless idiots. And when those of us who are outside the loop say howdy, you both join forces to tell us how we’re throwing our votes away. You know, my vote for Nader will be a vote taken away from Bush. He talks like a conservative, but he spends like a liberal. He says he’s compassionate, but he appoints John Asshole to be attorney general. He’s a tyrant and a thug. Third parties aren’t losing because the two parties are so great; third parties are losing because the two parties make it so hard for anyone else to participate in the process. Defeating Bush is a myopic goal. Restoring competition to the process is a better one.

52

Change the voting system. Until then, vote smarter, not harder. :stuck_out_tongue:

53

You aren’t usually a pedantic twit, Unc. As Otto pointed out, it’s possible to own some minute amount of stock that really doesn’t do anything for you - or is in your 401-k as this generation’s replacement for the funded pension plans companies used to offer 30-50 years ago.

Let’s define “stockholder class” as those who have enough of it that they don’t have to earn wages, whether or not they work.

And since you asked about “typical American”, since I was speaking in terms of economics, let’s try median wealth and income, plus or minus 20-30 percentage points. I’m flexible.

Lib - I’m all for making the political process more competitive; that’s why I was all for Perot in 1992. (But ditched his party early when it quickly became clear that he wanted it to be his personal toy, rather than letting his supporters have some say in what the party was about.)

When Nader was running as a Green, there was an argument that voting for him would build some sort of alternative to the major parties. Now he’s on his own, and independent candidacies are ephemeral affairs that never really produce anything.

I expect you’re not the only libertarian who will vote for Nader over Bush, not that I understand that: Nader’s not my idea of a libertarian.

54

It isn’t like he’s going to win anyway, so Libertarian can vote for him all he wants.

55

As much as I’d like to see George W. Bush ousted from office come November, I don’t agree with the idea of bashing Nader or demonizing folks who want to vote for him. Watching die-hard Dems play the “you’re either for Kerry or you’re against Kerry” card is distressingly painful, since that’s the kind of cheap, black-and-white intimidation tactic the Bush folks would use.

I think we should be better than that.

56

“Welcome to Chicago, vote early and often!”

57

They do if they are committed to not “acting poorly” again this time around. But look who’s acting all poorly!

58

Maybe I’ve got blinders on here, but what I’m hearing Dems say is… If you would have voted for Kerry were Nader not running, then you are an asshat for voting for Nader.

The reasoning remains simple… Nader will not win. Nader is not on a “party” ticket so no party will gain something by Nader getting 5% of the vote. Voting for Nader is simply a “protest” vote because you don’t like the whole system.

If you don’t care who actually wins the race (i.e. you detest the other candidates equally) then that’s just fine.

But I will then ignore you when you bitch about the putz that gets elected (whether it’s the Democratic Putz or the Republican Putz) because you did not vote for their opponent, you cast a protest vote about the whole system. You may as well have written in Donald Trump or Fidel Castro.

Though even people who do that get a lot more respect from me (presuming they learned about the other items on their ballot and voted on those items) than someone who simply avoids the polling place on election day.

59

I certainly hope the DNC does not pander to the Nader vote. They will (and are) doing to the DNC what the ‘Religious Right’ is doing to the RNC: Hijack the party, and take to the extreme that can no longer win the center. And without the center, you don’t win. Why bend over backwards to try get that 5% or so? We can moderate our platform, and go after the other 47 or so percent. The way the party is heading now, I would not be suprised to see those (now) fringe ‘Democrats for Bush’ groups gain strength, all because the DNC went after the wrong votes.

60

And I thought you were sharper than that. No, it’s not “yer fer us or agin us.” It’s simply this–we want to put as many Electoral College votes as possible to oust Bush. If you vote for Nader, you are taking away votes from Kerry, effectively giving votes to Bush.

Do you want Bush to win? Then siphon votes from Kerry by voting for Nader. It’s that simple.