elections

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(huskers @ Sep 29 2006, 07:48 AM) [snapback]325506[/snapback]</div>

I honestly don't know. I truly believed Gore would win the 2000 election, and then I truly believed Kerry would win in 2004. I don't dare get my hopes up this time.

 

Yes.

You'll start to see the money being thrown in ever increasing piles with each passing day. And the GOP has an endless pile of money to throw.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Dragonfly @ Oct 4 2006, 07:15 PM) [snapback]328252[/snapback]</div>

When both parties are dependent on transnational corporations for the money that is essential to an election, it hardly matters which one wins. And when one party is run by morons and the other by incompetents, I'm not sure I care.

But I do know I'd rather vote for an honest candidate and see her/him lose, than vote for a crook and see him/her win. So I'll be voting for the Green Party. They'll lose, but at least I'll be able to look myself in the mirror.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(huskers @ Oct 5 2006, 06:53 PM) [snapback]328762[/snapback]</div>

Like they got a chance of electing the dogcatcher in Dubuque!

Nader showed us how effective it is to throw away our votes on idealistic third parties. It got Bush elected the first time.

There are TWO parties, folks. Hold your nose, if you must, but vote for one of them. Stay-at-homes don't have the right to complain afterwords.

 

I maintain the Democrats NEED a viable progressive third party. Here's why:

Currently, the Republicans can point to the most radical leftist, even if they're not a Democrat, and say, "You see? They're all like that!" and the electorate eats it up. Not all of them, but enough to get the Republicans in office (with a little help from their pals at Diebold).

If there was a viable progressive party, if the Republicans tried to play that game, the Democrats could say, "No, we're the MODERATES. The radical leftists are over THERE. On the other hand, all the Republicans are like (name of most radical right-winger)." Then they could be true moderates, not the "try to be as conservative as possible yet still lose the election" party, which hasn't worked for the past eight years.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(huskers @ Oct 5 2006, 06:53 PM) [snapback]328762[/snapback]</div>

Your chances of being struck by lightning on your way to the polls are greater than your chances of your vote making a difference in the election.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Oct 8 2006, 09:39 AM) [snapback]329754[/snapback]</div>

Nader didn't get Bush elected. You are assuming that the Nader votes would have gone for Gore had Nader not been in the election. This was not the case for me. Nader was just the most convenient way to vote without voting for either Tweedledum or Tweedledee.

What really got Bush elected was Gore's utter and complete incompetence as a campaigner, aided just a little by electroal fraud in Florida (which wouldn't have mattered if Gore hadn't been stupid enough to throw away so many states where he ought to have won.)

Stayathomes can complain that there's nobody worth voting for in either of the big parties.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Oct 8 2006, 12:20 PM) [snapback]329788[/snapback]</div>

Well, since he got more total votes than Bush, he couldn't have been completely incompetent. The fraud sure went a long way, didn't it? I sense a little partisan undercurrent here.

If you can tell me that there would have been no difference in Gore vs. Bush as President, you have an utter and complete incompetence in thinking. You might not like him (I'm guessing this) but there is no way he can be compared to Bush.

So if NOBODY votes, the election will proceed just fine? Great logic! When we got old enough to vote we learned that our INDIVIDUAL vote wouldn't swing an election. This is news?

Complain all you want about the choice given you, but not voting is a pathetic cop-out. We have to stop being so selfish that we can only vote for somebody who rings all our bells. The world is a compromise. To the victor goes the spoils, not to the ones who picked up their marbles and went home.

 

Too many scandals going on - Foley, Noe, Abramoff. I think these will have a greater impact than they might think.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(prius biker @ Oct 8 2006, 06:17 PM) [snapback]329846[/snapback]</div>

I'd like to see power shared among the various branches of government since it appears that when one party controls both (or all three), things get swept under the convenient, self-serving "let's keep our party in power"carpet.

Dems in power or GOP in power, yes, there will be corruption somewhere. People in power are corruptible, sad but true - it goes with the territory. But with a system of real checks & balances (different party in the executive branch than the legislative), corruption in either party would be more quickly unearthed.

Then again, I have no idea who will win the mid-term elections so I haven't addressed the OP's question. If I had to guess, however, I'd bet that the GOP, with more money & thus more clout, would probably win the day.

I usually vote for the best person in any election. In this election, I will more inclined to vote for for the best thing for our country.

 

"If you can tell me that there would have been no difference in Gore vs. Bush as President, you have an utter and complete incompetence in thinking. You might not like him (I'm guessing this) but there is no way he can be compared to Bush."

The phrase "you have an utter and complete incompetence in thinking" is both unkind and awkwardly phrased. Do you mean to say "your thinking is utterly and completely incompetent"?

Have a nice weekend.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Oct 8 2006, 02:12 PM) [snapback]329813[/snapback]</div>

Yes, I am partisan. I support the philosophy of the Green Party. Since I support what they stand for, I vote for them. Are you going to tell me that as a consciencious citizen, I should abandon the party that I believe is best for the country, and vote for a corrupt party, merely because (in your view) it is less corrupt than the other big party? Are you telling me that I should abandon the only honest participants in the election because they won't have a chance of winning until enough people vote for them to make them a major party?

Gore got more votes because in the end, the election was between a dufus and a moron.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Oct 8 2006, 02:12 PM) [snapback]329813[/snapback]</div>

Gore would have flushed just as much money as Bush does down the sewer of military spending, within 5% or so. Gore talks a fine environmentalist argument, but he'd have still given the country away to the corporations that funded his election, within 5% of Bush or so. Gore agrees 100% with Bush that capitalism is the only acceptable way to structure an economy. You might tell me that he'd not have gone to war with Iraq (we'll never know) but historically the Democrats are just as warmongering as the Republicans, and the war strategy of both parties has always been to target civilians (while hotly denying it) in order to try to terrorize them into rising up against their government (an inhumane and illegal strategy that never works!).

Yep. I sure can compare Gore with Bush. You, as a loyal partisan Democrat, will disagree. But it's a matter of opinion, and I can very well and easily make the comparison.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Oct 8 2006, 02:12 PM) [snapback]329813[/snapback]</div>

If nobody votes, it will be obvious that our electoral system is a farce. We have the most undemocratic electoral system of any "democracy": a system where it is virtually impossible for a third party to be included in the process, and where the obscene quantity of money required to run an election puts the "democratic" process out of the reach of any but the obscenely wealthy and the giant transnational corporations.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Oct 8 2006, 02:12 PM) [snapback]329813[/snapback]</div>

I do not require that a candidate agree with me on everything in order to get my vote. But I will not vote for murderers. And both big parties advocate the cold-blooded murder of civilians on a regular and ongoing basis. (Oh, yes, they don't put it in those words. They say that this or that war is "necessary," and that civilian "casualties" are "unavoidable." Well, put in plain language, they are saying that US interests are served by killing civilians, and I won't vote for toads like that.)

And I do not "pick up my marbles and go home," as you put it. I vote for the party that represents what I believe in. Because I'd rather vote for an honest man and see him lose than vote for a murdering corrupt scumbag and see him win.

And if the best the Democrats can do is claim that they are not as bad as the other guy, then they deserve to lose.

The Democratic Party was formed as an unholy alliance between northern liberals and southern racist conservatives. It was a marriage born in hell, and its platform from the first has been a little bit of social liberalism mixed in with a big dose of bigotry and warmongering. And that sure ain't gonna get my vote.

Blaming Nader voters for the Bush victory makes about as much sense as telling a battered wife it was her own fault her husband beat her, because she should have done everything he told her to do, and hid in a closet when he came home drunk. The Democratic party has abused the people who vote for it long enough. It's time they left it, because as long as they stick around, it'll keep abusing them, just as the wife-beater will keep beating his wife, no matter what she does.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(jared2 @ Oct 8 2006, 04:58 PM) [snapback]329864[/snapback]</div>

Actually, I was just parroting his words back to him. I wouldn't have used this phrase in the first place but I figured he'd understand his vocabulary better than my own.

 

I felt like you do at one time Daniel, but as time goes by I've softened my view quite a bit. First don't get me wrong, the Greens are fine people and I admire everything they stand for, but at present I don't feel they have any chance of winning any federal elections. Now you've said you would rather vote for someone you respected and lose rather than pick the lesser of two evils, well many times that may apply. But then you need to look at the alternative, I didn't like either Reagan or Mondale so I voted for a third party, then watched my paycheck shrink after each one of Reagan's tax cuts (yea, somehow my taxes went up with each of his cuts). That was a bitter pill to swallow, and from that point on, I was determined to make sure I would vote for one of the majors. With a notable exception, I did vote for Jessie Ventura, not only a colorfull sort, but a WHOLE lot better than the jerk we now have.

Now, I do disagree with your statement that they are all corrupt. Yes there are corrupt people in both parties to be sure. But working on Wellstone's campaigns taught me that there are those that cannot be corrupted, I recomend this editorial for reference, the facts he points out are well known in these parts. And again, lets say when the greens grow to the point where they become viable, can you know they will not become corrupted?

Your pointing out that both parties are very much different than their roots is quite correct. But everything evolves, we both know that, if Eisenhower or Goldwater could see what has become of the Republicans, they would be turning over in their graves. As far as the Democrats go, well the old Dixiecrat wing has actually split off and become Republican, as for the present day Democrats (DFL as they are known here), well were Hubert Humphrey were here today, well they would ge getting an ear full to be sure.

But for the present, IMO the most critical objective we have on Nov 7th, it to get enough Democrats back in congress to return some checks and balances back into government. Now if we could get enough to really hold the Bushiveks accountable, that would be iceing on the cake.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Oct 8 2006, 09:52 PM) [snapback]329881[/snapback]</div>

I see.

Concerning the election, it is quite true that both parties simply serve the oligarchy. It is also true that, mathematically, an individual's vote counts for nothing. On the other hand, hundreds of thousands of votes do count, and the democrats are marginally better than the republicans who have set a new low standard in governing. Gore would almost certainly not have been as bad as Bush. The question needs to be asked, however - how much independence does any president really have anyway? Are they not, to a large extent, merely puppets of the real corporate power that runs this world? Having said all this, yes, it is better to vote than not if only because democratic control of the house might be some check on the draconian powers this government has assumed.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Oct 8 2006, 05:44 PM) [snapback]329870[/snapback]</div>

I won't bother to reply in detail to you because there seems to be no point that you aren't 100% certain of and facts won't budge you at all. You throw around figures that have no basis. You call people names and find them guilty of the most horrendous crimes. You call me a partisan, knowing nothing of how I really voted in anything. Right now, I support the Democrats because they offer some buffer against the patent evil of the all-powerful Republicans who seem to have forgotten everything they once stood for. Government isn't a gathering of the virtuous. It is a system meant to keep man's base tendencies within check.

In the past I have voted Republican from time to time. I was disappointed when my man lost, of whatever party, but never feared for the country because the other guy won. Not until now. If you don't see the value of eliminating the current monarchy, your Green Party wish-list is a laughing stock. It's as if a small group of French, when taken over by Germany in WWII, objected on the basis that wine prices might suffer. It's simply irrelevant.

If this is typical of the Green Party philosophy, you can vote with them until hell freezes over and you'll never get anybody elected anywhere. There is no reason in your arguments, only barely controlled anger and hostility in the way this country works. If you don't like it, find an effective way of working for change, not some pie-in-the-sky daydream of a new world a'comin'.

Ralph Nader was once an idealist with a few good ideas. He got caught up in his own self-image until it became clear that he, like yourself, would never work the necessary compromises to get the job done. If he didn't win, he didn't care how America suffered. He, like you, thinks we deserve it. You both feel self-righteous that you voted for "truth." You want purity, become a monk. You want good government, learn to work with others at obtaining one, not damning everything that exists. You're tilting at windmills and you'll be pretty miserable with America and how it is run for the rest of your life. That is sad in such a wonderful country.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Oct 8 2006, 07:28 PM) [snapback]329897[/snapback]</div>

So you feel that my objection to war is no different than someone's concern over wine prices? Or that I should not use the word "corrupt" for politicians who give big campaign contributors access before ordinary citizens?

For the rest (the several preceding posts, both polite and nasty) I have stated my position in this post, which, because it is long, I link to rather than repeat in full.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Oct 9 2006, 04:57 AM) [snapback]329986[/snapback]</div>

I think we agree that we disagree.

Let's shake hands and come out on some other topic.

Thanks for the blood pressure surge!

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Oct 8 2006, 11:39 AM) [snapback]329754[/snapback]</div>

Losing votes to Nader may have have elected Bush, but it also sent a message to Democrats - stand up and make a difference!

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Oct 8 2006, 11:39 AM) [snapback]329754[/snapback]</div>

There are two parties, sure. And as long as we toe the party line, there will never be a real choice.
Vote for the candidate, not the party!
I'll vote my conscience and yes, I'll keep complaining!