Run In With Mr. Edwards

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:a%pWc.76075$TI1.45999@attbi_s52...
Well, I'm hoping to see Richard Campagna
(http://www.badnarik.org/campagna_bio.php) in Iowa one of these days. He
and his running mate, Michael Badnarik, are starting to look like the only
viable alternatives for my vote.

Until we fix the voting system in the US, a vote for anyone other than the
two major candidates is really just a vote against the person you'd have
otherwise voted for. And of course, that's exactly the opposite of what you
really want.

If you genuinely couldn't care less which of the two major candidates gets
elected, then I suppose you might as well vote for some other random person.
No different than staying home, or leaving that race unvoted on your ballot.
Certainly no better though.

I've always been a bit puzzled that the independent parties don't stop
wasting time putting up candidates for races they'll never win, drawing
votes from the major candidate most closely aligned with their thinking.
It's counterproductive. They'd do much better working on the voting process
first, so that third-party races were actually viable rather than
disruptive.

I, for one, would love to be able to vote for someone other than a Rep or
Dem in a way that was actually meaningful.

Pete

I guess it's going to take a Constitutional amendment (sure, right)
to have the option "None of the above".

"Blanche" wrote in message
...
I guess it's going to take a Constitutional amendment (sure, right)
to have the option "None of the above".

It might. I'm not really sure, since to be honest, I've never bothered to
look up what actually defines exactly how we vote.

I mean, yes...the electoral college is from the Constitution, but that's not
the real problem, not as it's used today. If states, for example, allowed
voters to vote for more than one candidate, then a vote for Nader would not
mean (on average) a vote against Kerry, as it does today.

There is ample precedent for alternative voting mechanisms. The main
problem is that the folks who control how we vote are the same folks who
have a vested interest in locking out all of the "third parties". Though,
given how the Democrats claim that Nader screwed up the last election for
them, it may be that they may find that third parties that get popular
enough (and it doesn't take much popularity) are enough of a thorn in their
side that they would be willing to give up their virtual monopoly (shared
with the Republicans, who so far haven't had a similarly disruptive similar
party running with them) on holding office.

One thing's for sure, when you've got one party (the Republicans in this
case) helping fund activities intended to support another party (the
Greens), simply because the more that other party succeeds, the less the
real competition (the Democrats) can succeed, something is really screwed
up.

Pete

Peter Duniho wrote:
"Blanche" wrote in message
...

I guess it's going to take a Constitutional amendment (sure, right)
to have the option "None of the above".


It might. I'm not really sure, since to be honest, I've never bothered to
look up what actually defines exactly how we vote.

I mean, yes...the electoral college is from the Constitution, but that's not
the real problem, not as it's used today. If states, for example, allowed
voters to vote for more than one candidate, then a vote for Nader would not
mean (on average) a vote against Kerry, as it does today.

There is ample precedent for alternative voting mechanisms. The main
problem is that the folks who control how we vote are the same folks who
have a vested interest in locking out all of the "third parties". Though,
given how the Democrats claim that Nader screwed up the last election for
them, it may be that they may find that third parties that get popular
enough (and it doesn't take much popularity) are enough of a thorn in their
side that they would be willing to give up their virtual monopoly (shared
with the Republicans, who so far haven't had a similarly disruptive similar
party running with them) on holding office.

One thing's for sure, when you've got one party (the Republicans in this
case) helping fund activities intended to support another party (the
Greens), simply because the more that other party succeeds, the less the
real competition (the Democrats) can succeed, something is really screwed
up.

Pete



Pete, you're assuming that having a third, fourth, or more parties would
be good for politics. Having been born in a country that has a
notoriously fractured political structure, with 50+ parties running for
parliment and a good dozen or so well represented, I can attest to the
fact that multi-party politics serves only to benefit the fringe
fanatics by making them more important than they really are because they
are necessary for coalition building. What you end up with is an
incredibly unstable government that is always under the threat of
breaking apart. The smaller, fringe (and sometimes fanatic) parties
twist the arms of the coalition to get their way, to the detriment of
the country. Of course, I am talking about Israel, a country mired in an
asinine political system that has the moderate majority held hostage by
the radicals on every side (and we're talking about a completely
multi-dimensional political spectrum). The results have been disastrous
for Israel in both domestic and foreign policy.

Yes sir, I have come to appreciate the blandness and uniformity of the
Republicrat system. It's the worst system, except for all the others
:-) Seriously, though, the two party system necessitates a measure of
moderation, since the only way a radical government can stay in power is
if a majority of American voters are radical, at which point it's
difficult to call that segment of the population radical. That's not
too bad of a system, IMHO.

Having said that, the beauty of the current system is that it has NO
basis in law. There ARE other parties, they DO get on ballots, and
there have been plenty of precedents for third party or no party
candidates being elected into office. If one of the major parties takes
a swing too far in one direction as to turn off a lot of voters, and
some other party or candidate takes a position that does resonate with
people widely, then that party will run and win, period.

I find it unhelpful to complain about the "system" when what we're
really talking about is current voting patterns. Those can be changed
if the message has wide merit and appeal. And yes, that also includes
having enough merit and appeal to enable the third party to raise funds
to become viable. I think it's only fair.

-Aviv Hod

"Aviv Hod" wrote in
message ...
Pete, you're assuming that having a third, fourth, or more parties would
be good for politics.

Yes, that's true.

Having been born in a country that has a
notoriously fractured political structure, with 50+ parties running for
parliment and a good dozen or so well represented, I can attest to the
fact that multi-party politics serves only to benefit the fringe
fanatics by making them more important than they really are because they
are necessary for coalition building. What you end up with is an
incredibly unstable government that is always under the threat of
breaking apart.

Well, I never thought of it that way. That said, under a change like what I
proposed, a third party would still not get into office unless they had the
majority vote. It just makes it easier for the people to express their true
desire, rather than always having to choose between things like "the lesser
of two evils" and "voting one's heart".

Also, while I readily admit that the US government is not nearly in as great
a state of distraction as the Israeli government, I'll also suggest that
there are other very significant factors at work in Israel that are unlikely
to ever be an issue here. Maybe we can "handle it" even as another country
could not.

[...]
Having said that, the beauty of the current system is that it has NO
basis in law. There ARE other parties, they DO get on ballots, and
there have been plenty of precedents for third party or no party
candidates being elected into office.

Not in any election that really matters. A primary party candidate would
have to really go off the deep end to open up things for an independent, or
the office would have to be uncontested.

[...]
I find it unhelpful to complain about the "system" when what we're
really talking about is current voting patterns. Those can be changed
if the message has wide merit and appeal.

I disagree. An independent or secondary party candidate would have to spend
several orders of magnitude more money than the primary candidates just to
even have a hope of competing. Equal spending isn't going to do it, and
there's not even the finances available for equal spending. The current
system completely locks out third parties, even when they have a serious,
viable platform.

I will repeat my previous observation: when one party is funding another
party just to screw a third party, there's something wrong.

Pete