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0 pointsbluGill7mo ago0 comments

No because the statistics are counted. People in the "smoke filled backrooms" pay attention to what third party messages are getting attention and in turn use that to inform how they change. Long term it isn't a bad strategy, but it does mean you have to accept whoever wins (though in rare cases a third party has won) for today. If one candidate isn't too bad I will vote for them.

In my case I've decided on criteria is has not held this office for more than one term (that is I give you two terms no matter what office you are running for) because no matter how much I agree with you I don't want anyone to spend too long in government.

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4 comments · 2 top-level

greedo7mo ago· 1 in thread

To quote Marlow Stanfield, "You want it to be one way. But it's the other way."

In the US electoral system, voting third party doesn't send a signal. It throws away your vote. Let's take a look at what voting third party has done.

1. Voting for Nader led to Bush Jr. winning the presidency in 2000. 2. Voting for Jill Stein led to the first Trump presidency in 2016.

So you got that going for you.

kelipso7mo ago

I consider third parties running in Presidential elections to be joke candidacies but what you’re saying is just the whining of whoever lost the election that was influenced by third party voters. Would have been the same result if the third party voters didn’t vote btw.

anigbrowl7mo ago· 1 in thread

People in the "smoke filled backrooms" pay attention to what third party messages are getting attention and in turn use that to inform how they change.

Kinda like how the Libertarians got ~3% of the vote 2016, and over the following years the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire was taken over by groypers and the national LP endorsed Trump in 2024? I mean, in an ideal polity you'd be right, major parties would pay attention to where they're losing votes at the margin to inform their policy decisions. But we live in a far-from-ideal polity where the two major parties systematically undermine minor party candidates at anything above the county level.

bluGillOP7mo ago

Yeah, that is a danger. But when you don't want the major party candidates to win there isn't much other choice.

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