SecretMethod70

Perhaps you somehow got out of US History in high school, or perhaps you just didn't pay full attention in 2000, but the popular vote means nothing in the presidential election. If you can explain to me why it's important that I, in Illinois, a state where Kerry is going to win by 10%+, a state that, in terms of presidential elections, is about as liberal as California, should vote for Kerry even when he doesn't represent my views, then I'll do so. The truth is, the whole concept of the wasted vote, even if it *did* hold any water, only does in battleground states - and that's less than half the states in the country. In Illinois and many other states, there are essentially two options: everyone vote for Kerry even when he doesn't represent our views, so that Kerry wins the state by some relatively large percentage and thinks he has more support than he does and the party that DOES better represent our views gets no boost whatsoever in any way; or we can vote our conscience and Kerry will STILL win the state by a smaller margin, realize that while he may be president he doesn't accurately represent as many people as he might otherwise think, and the third party which does gets more support as well.

So, there are only about 18 states where one could logically point to a third party vote as being a wasted vote or a spoiler vote. Next comes the problem of WHO it spoils the election for. In my experience most Badnarik supporters are pretty evenly split on who they dislike most. Both are for bigger government and more spending, just in different ways. So, Badnarik supporters hail from both sides. One could then argue that it's not a spoiler at all. Or, if you want to go by the typical state of affairs, Libertarian voters, while they can come from both sides, many times are disenfranchised Republicans. If a vote for Badnarik is likely to be a spoiler for anyone, it's likely to be a spoiler for Bush. There's real concern in New Mexico right now that that's precisely what will happen.

And then there's the idea that it's a wasted vote. Why is voting for what I believe in a waste because my candidate won't win? If this is what you believe, will you admit to me, if Kerry doesn't win, that your vote was wasted? Why bother voting at all if your candidate doesn't win? If a vote for a loser is a wasted vote, since apparently voting is like betting on horses and not like telling the government who you would most prefer to run it, then will you promise to not vote in 2008 if you "waste" your vote in this election on Kerry? In fact, did you vote for Gore in 2000? He lost - you wasted your vote - you shouldn't vote in this election either since your vote is just going to be "wasted."

"Next election, next election, we can vote third parties next election"....and then the next election rolls around and, again, both major parties will tell us "this is the most important election in recent history!" and they'll tell us "don't vote for a third party, it's a wasted vote!" and the news media will help by not informing people about their options in the first place.....and so on and so on. Or there's "I'll vote for a third party once they get enough support that they have a shot at winning." Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. Imagine, there could be 45% of the country (enough to win an election since plurality voting sucks) all waiting for the OTHER people to go first. If they all voted their conscience, however, we could be talking about president Cobb in 2004, or president Badnarik. Of course, you're right, there's not 45% underground support. Why? Most of the people simply have no clue. It's pretty difficult to gain support when the two major parties are utilizing the media to reiterate "wasted vote. wasted vote. wasted vote." over and over again. We're told a vote for a third party is a wasted vote, and just to make sure that the effect is complete, we're ONLY told that - never who these people are that we could waste our vote on, just that it's a wasted vote.

So, tell me why it's so important that I vote for Kerry in Illinois and I'll do so. Oh, and then I'll tell one of the many Badnarik supporters I know about this enlightening information and he'll vote for Kerry in Texas too, as opposed to "wasting his vote" and showing government how he'd REALLY like it to be run - nevermind the fact there's not a snowball's chance in Hell that Kerry will win Texas. And then I'll inform a few other Badnarik supporters I know about my astonishing revelation and they can go vote for Bush as well since that may be their lesser of two evils....of couse, they may live in battleground states. Bush could win the election because of it but, hey! No one wasted their vote and now Bush gets to think he has more support than he really does! And to top it all of we'll have helped to keep the third parties delegitimized.

"Somehow, the term 'thinking for yourself' has become 'wasting your vote.' The definition of liberty is making your own choices." -- Michael Badnarik

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