Originally Posted by ratbastid

I'm a pragmatist about these things. I think a protest vote is great, when your protest doesn't imperil something else.

Let's say (just hypothetically) that you'd freaking vomit if McCain were elected, you could live with an Obama presidency, and your state is close. I think NOT giving your vote to Obama in such a situation would be irresponsible. Even if the idealistic thing to do would be to hew to your principles vote (and I shudder as I type this) McKinney, you're opening the door to a McCain victory, and IMO that's way worse than not showing Cynthia your love.

But yeah, if your state is a foregone conclusion, let 'er rip. If I still lived in Utah, I'd probably never vote Democrat.

Originally Posted by rlbond86

Unfortunately, the problem lies in the election system, called the plurality system. This directly leads to two "supermarket" parties because the system is extremely susceptible to tactical voting. If we used something like instant runoff voting, where a voter might rank his or her top 3 selections, the current system would make third-party candidacies more possible.