According to this news story, on September 24, Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell said that voters who vote for someone other than President Obama or Mitt Romney are “wasting their vote.”
According to this news story, on September 24, Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell said that voters who vote for someone other than President Obama or Mitt Romney are “wasting their vote.”
Actually, voters who do vote for those two, or for McDonnell, are the ones who are wasted.
Several famous quotes can be posted here. I’ll just go with, “The only time you waste your vote is when you don’t use it.”
He just doesn’t get it. When the two corporately-controlled parties fail to represent me and my vision for America, then they do not deserve my vote!
I am proudly voting for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party and I urge everyone to support the candidate whom you feel represents you, not who they tell you to vote for. The two corporate parties are responsible for the mess this country is in, so don’t reward them with your vote.
Gov McDonnell tries to have it both ways by saying that at the end of the day Goode is not going to be a factor and that voters are wasting their vote by voting for him. Anyone making the charge that another is or is planning to waste their vote, they should expect and get some pushback. In McDonnels case, he makes plain that he has no real point other than his being a partisan.
But for those who make a more serious attempt frame a case for vote wasting it should be observed the extreme unliklihood of any election, much less a statewide one ending in a tie or plurality of one. In all other outcomes there is a multiplicity of wasted votes if one assumes voters do not vote for the candidate they most preferred,(using their vote instead to vote against and not for) which no voter should made to feel bad about doing within a worthy electoral arrangement. If every voter voted for their preferred candidacy it would be discovered that one or both major party candidacies have been relying on the concept of the wasted vote far more than alternative parties have.
The reality of the existence of the wasted vote argument is a byproduct of an inferior electoral system.
You know what I’d really like to see? More Green-Libertarian cooperation against the duopoly, and not in the James Ogle joint-ticket sense. Rather, I’d like to see more cooperation on ballot access (although this does happen sometimes in lawsuits), a mutual non-aggression pact for non-statewide offices (ie, no Green will run in District X this year, and no Libertarian will run in District Y this year), and perhaps most importantly, a constant series of informative, civil debates when Greens and Libs. are running for the same statewide offices. Sure, mainstream channels won’t pick them up at first, but in this day and age, many bloggers would be willing to watch them online or on CSPAN. Eventually I could see someone like Mark Cuban putting a Green-LP presidential debate on HDNet. Cobb and Badnarik were very marginal candidates in 2004, but it was at least nice to see their sense of cooperation and shared purpose.
The winner of the lesser of the 2 MAJOR evils will claim a mighty *mandate* from Hell to do whatever —
since the gerrymander Congress and gerrymander State legislatures only *represent* a collection of local robot party hack gangs in minority rule political concentration camps.
1/2 votes x 1/2 gerrymander areas = 1/4 CONTROL.
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P.R. and nonpartisan App.V.
The latest installment of Nate Silver’s 538 (released today) gives the probability of an Obama victory in Virginia as 73%. McDonnell’s real worry must be that his beloved Virginia will be the spoiler for his GOP and that it may come down to the Virginia vote for former Virginia U.S. House member Goode.
“I am proudly voting for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party and I urge everyone to support the candidate whom you feel represents you, not who they tell you to vote for.”
Perfect!! Well stated, bflosue! In my case, I am voting for Virgil Goode. Willard Romney would have had to hold a gun to my childrens’ head to get my vote.
“I am proudly voting for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party and I urge everyone to support the candidate whom you feel represents you, not who they tell you to vote for.”
Perfect!! Well stated, bflosue! In my case, I am voting for Virgil Goode. Willard Romney would have to hold a gun to my childrens’ head to get my vote.
He wouldn’t find that morally challenging.
What people like Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell don’t seem to realize that some of us not only don’t want to vote for Barack Obama or Mitt Romney, we want them to know that we went out of our waynot to vote for them. I like Dr. Jill Stein, but I dislike Barack Obama more than I like her. I want Barack Obama to know that my vote came right out of his hide.
This is how the two parties control us. They convince us that voting 3rd party is a wasted vote. If we don’t vote for the D and R then the D and R won’t win. But you can’t tell people this because they only see the two parties.
Actually the only voters who can be sure they aren’t wasting their vote are the “3rd party” voters because those are the voters who are trying to influence public policy. Winning the election would just be a bonus for them. The people who vote for the legacy parties on the other hand have to be concerned with wasting their vote because if they don’t vote for a winner they get nothing. That’s the problem with the “2 party” system, most votes are wasted because most votes go to losers. The simple fact is most people don’t get represented in government.