can we vote for imaginary politicians now?
bloodfart@lemmy.ml 3 months ago
~stop voting for politicians who don’t align with your values and politics~
exanime@lemmy.world 3 months ago
bloodfart@lemmy.ml 3 months ago
what politics do you have? what motivates you?
I like the party for socialism and liberation and it’s a great time to like them because they’re running a presidential candidate on a platform of palestinian statehood and an end to arms shipments to israel, but you might have different values.
what do you wish you could vote for?
exanime@lemmy.world 2 months ago
I don’t believe there is a single politician out there who mean more than 2% of what they say.
I definitely lean left in almost any category… the problem is that even if a politician or party directly promise, word for word, exactly what I want. There is zero chance they will even try to implement it when they get to power; worse, there is not even a way to keep them accountable except “not voting for them again”.
I live in Canada and I voted for Trudeau in great part for electoral reform which was directly promised and then completely 180d. Trudeau did a couple of OK things but for the most part has been mediocre (not the cause of all our problems as the opposition claims). However, I find myself now in the spot where I either vote for Trudeau again to keep on the mediocrity train, or vote for PP who stands for nothing, has accomplished nothing in over 20 years of being a public employee leech and has all but promised he will run the country off a cliff to own the libs
bloodfart@lemmy.ml 2 months ago
i’m not as familiar with canadian politics as i could be, who’s PP?
IIRC you have a communist party and a ml party. idk if they have a decent stance on the issues that motivate you but they’re probably not a fall in line behind the liberals party like americas DSA is…
andros_rex@lemmy.world 3 months ago
I live in Oklahoma. Often, I don’t even get to vote for a position, because the only candidate that runs is a Republican.
And having volunteered on several Dem campaigns, that’s because Oklahoman republicans are allowed to terrorize and harass Dems into not running at all.
bloodfart@lemmy.ml 3 months ago
sometimes i see ballots like that too. if you don’t have an option, but there’s a write in line, write in something, anything. if there’s no write in line and you don’t see a candidate you like, leave that field blank.
some places are already dominated by a party machine. in those cases it might be best to do mutual aid like helping the people around you instead of volunteering for a political party that is unpopular and going to face insane opposition anyway.
I don’t have all the answers for everyone in every case and place.
Jentu@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 months ago
Does this also apply to primaries? My ruby red state has an open primary, and our democrat ran unopposed, so I voted for the less “trumpy” republican for state positions. Excited that my state will have the PSL candidate on the ticket this November though.
agent_nycto@lemmy.world 3 months ago
Oh man I’d love to, but with the current voting system and the two parties, it’s between a shit sandwich and a shit sandwich with razors in it.
uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 months ago
King Log (does nothing) and King Heron (eats all the frogs, id est, the constituency).
This is an old problem.
bloodfart@lemmy.ml 3 months ago
Wow, where do you live that there aren’t any third parties that align with your values or politics?
uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 months ago
Third parties really don’t matter. You have one vote which is against the guy who will do his part for Project 2025 (end democracy – and Democrats – and install a one-party autocratic state, who doesn’t even have to pretend to care what you think). And you do that by voting for the other popular guy, the Democrat.
If you vote for a third party or you don’t vote, then you do nothing to stop the rise of autocracy. Obviously, a vote for the Republican is a vote to accelerate the one-party autocracy process. So those are your options.
Third parties only act as spoilers in FPTP elections, and the campaign machines for both major parties regard and will regard them as such.
Ross Perot ran for President as an independent as a third party candidate getting 18% of the vote and none of the EC, and is the record holder for the largest share by a third-party presidential candidate.
bloodfart@lemmy.ml 2 months ago
It’s wild that you chose Perot as your example when he’s generally accepted as having not been a spoiler and his anti-nafta platform drug it kicking and screaming into daylight for everyone to see.
If anything, Perot ‘92 was a great example of a non spoiler third party forcing both major parties to actually be held accountable for their policies.
When both parties don’t represent you, vote for one that does!
lightnsfw@reddthat.com 3 months ago
I live in a rural area and all options are basically the same. The only real difference is Republicans usually going hard on the maga shit. Policy wise there’s not a ton of difference. Sometimes we’ll get a libertarian.
bloodfart@lemmy.ml 3 months ago
if you see an option with a write in part, write in someone instead of casting a vote for a candidate you don’t like.
if there’s not an option to write in your choice, don’t fill that part out.
someone else commented and talked about being in a place where everything is pretty much dominated by the republican political machine. in those cases it might be better to focus on mutual aid and working in local county and town meetings instead of attaching yourself to a party.
if you’ve got the time, putting the screws to someone in a county board of commissioners meeting over spending a bunch of money on the local cops riot gear that they never use instead of straightening up peoples screwy culverts is a sure win.
agent_nycto@lemmy.world 3 months ago
The good ol us of a
bloodfart@lemmy.ml 3 months ago
I like party for socialism and liberation. If they don’t have a candidate listed on your states ballot but they’re running one you can write em in.
What kind of politics do you have? I suggested psl because they’re running on a platform of Palestinian statehood and an end to weapons shipments to Israel and those issues seem to be what’s disgusting people with the democrats and republicans this go around, but what else motivates you?