Yesterday on my Facebook page I shared a link where you could check which of your friends “Like” the Mitt Romney facebook page.
Here’s how I see it…
There are lots of third-party presidential candidates (Ralph Nader, etc) that are way more genuine and intelligent than the traditional Democrat and Republican candidates. They have been slowly getting more votes over the decade.
If the 3rd parties steadily garner a 2% increase in popular vote for every 4-year presidential election, then maybe after a century a third party candidate will be elected. But we’d have already lost all our marbles as a nation.
But there’s a problem with voting for a 3rd party in a swing state…
In 2000, Ralph Nader (Green party) got almost 3% of the national vote (3 million votes). It was because of this that Al Gore lost the vote in some swing states. And then we had Bush. Fuck.
What if you’re in a swing state? What if you want Obama to win instead of Romney, only cause he’s the lesser of two evils, and you wish you could vote for Gary Johnson (Libertarian) but you cant because you live in a swing state. You don’t want to risk tipping the electoral vote toward Romney for your state by taking votes away from Obama, right? So you can’t vote for Gary Johnson if you’re in a swing state.
So how do we give third parties a chance to win the presidency?
Historically, third party candidates are very rarely involved in the debates that happen after Summer, closer to the election in Fall. They tend to check the effectiveness of the main parties. They also tend to bring issues onto the national agenda that the major-party candidate avoid (like poverty or the war on drugs!).
More to the point: They don’t have the financial support to compete with national advertising and the media ignores their voice, making them even more unheard of. The media tends to ignore their place in national polls, grouping them as “Other” or “Undecided” voters.
So what is Gary Johnson (and Ron Paul) rooting for if he knows he can’t win the presidency?
Well he’s hoping to receive 5% of the popular vote. If he gets 5%, he gets his hand in the $3 presidential election campaign fund that 30+ million voters typically check off.
Gary Johnson is registered in 49 states so he may get his share of that fund for the next election. Then he will hope to get more votes in 2016. Then even more in 2020 and so on… Until he’s a president. I guess that’s the idea. Right?
For those who are not in swing states, I think we just have to… Commit and vote for the third party candidate of your choice to send a message how displeased you are of this asinine Democrat/Republican bull shit.
Too bad politics suck… a lot. It’s annoying thinking about it, that’s why my posts regarding politics are far and few in between.
[Legal] Corruption is the norm. It’s clear as day and it’s going to be the reason for the downfall of this country. Historically, the American people have been so engrained with doing everything by the book. Everything requires permits, registration, licensing, etc. But money (greed; corruption; lobbying) has been muddying this all up. Government doesn’t work so well when money becomes the name of the game. Sorry folks. Let’s hope we get political change by reforming campaign finance, and maybe we won’t have to resort to a revolution when gas hits $20/gallon (or our dollar falls).(Don’t think gas will hit $20/gallon? We reached peak oil in the mid 2000’s. Of the 2 trillion estimated gallons of oil on earth, about half have been consumed. Energy consumption world wide increases every year. It’s a finite resource.)
We’ve long reached our ability to keep up with the demand as we consume more each year. When places like India and China start using cars as readily as the very-developed nations, we would surely see some obscene prices. Optimistic estimations of peak production forecast the global decline will begin after 2020, and assume major investments in alternatives will occur before a crisis, without requiring major changes in the lifestyle of heavily oil-consuming nations.
Who knows, really?
All I know is that I have to learn all about sustainable living because the people who can live off the grid and for themselves are going to be the ones least affected by the downfall of this country. Some people may laugh at indigenous people, thinking they are uncivilized and primitive. They know how to live, off the earth, naturally. If shit hits the fan, they’ll be here and you’ll be dead.
Start riding your bike. Start using the metro. Stop wasting your water on keeping your useless grass lawn green. Replace your grass with a garden that actually produces FOOD you can EAT.
