Support for Third U.S. Political Party Up to 63%

Yep, all of us plebs want RCV. But the problem is in order to get it, we need one of two major parties in control to make the change. But they don't want to make the change because they know if they do, us plebs will actually start voting for independent parties and they'll lose their power. :(

So you gonna just keep complaining online or do something to make them?

I'm personally in favor of STAR, takes how leading candidates fair in head to head matchups against each other without confronting voters with the possible ballot Atlas of a true condorcet vote

Stop Tim (my neighbor from) Voting? I'm for that. Dude is a giant dork and votes explicitly for things he thinks will fuck things up, not things he thinks will improve society. He's a doomsday dude, wants society to go to hell in a handbasket so, per his religion, his god can come and fuck it up more. I mean, believe what you want, just, let's try and make this place better not worse.

And yet when I say this people look at me like I'm crazy and tell me "Sir this is a Wendy's"

Seriously, though, Approval Voting is literally the simplest voting method (vote yes or no on each candidate) and yet it has zero traction.

That's why I always mention it. I personally would prefer Ranked Choice. However, considering the introduction intelligence of many Americans, telling them "number 1, 2, 3, etc based on how much you like the candidates" might confuse them. Instead, "mark the ones you like" is much easier.

The main problem with Approval is that it still encourages strategic voting. If a 3rd party I really like is close to beating a mainstream party I'd tolerate, I'm incentivized to not select the mainstream party.

I seriously doubt a Approval would ever elect a 3rd party candidate.

What if we just took all the leftist policies that Republican voters say they love in polls, but just replaced their names with new names that Fox News hasn't had a chance to program their viewers on? Instead of Universal Healthcare, we'll call it the American Bodily Integrity Defense Initiative or patriot care or some shit. No, no, it's not high speed rail, it's the Uncle Sam Express. No, no, it's not universal college, it's the "Beating China By Investing in Education Strategic Defense Initiative". Etc.

Realistically there are 3 major groupings already:

• Progressives
• Corporate centrists
• Unrepentant Nazis

Something that is not "too extreme" - something that strikes a compromise with fascists that want to kill fellow citizens for merely existing (gays, trans, POC, etc.) or disagreeing with them and people that support the Constitution and civil rights and institutional norms. Because that second group is just so extreme.

I like the idea of Schrödinger's party. It's either hard left or hard right but, like a mystery prize on a shitty gameshow, you won't find out until after the votes are placed.

Approval voting is mathematically sane, rewards candidates that are broadly acceptable rather than extremists, and is easy to explain to voters: "Vote for every candidate whom you would be okay with."

Candidates get more votes by building big tents than fanatical bases; voters maximize their power by honestly representing their views, and (unlike IRV) there's no case where thinking better of a candidate will lead you to vote in a way that causes that candidate to lose.

I'm still annoyed that the Massachusetts ballot question on RCV failed to pass because of the unclear phrasing

FYI it's first past the post, not pole.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-past-the-post_voting

Ahh, which is which?

If you see what set off someone like James M. Buchanan, as well as people like Falwell: it was about maintaining segregation. This is what motivates so very many of them. Their claims of "conservative values" are so much noise.

Let me tell you about the cult I belonged to once that explicitly preached the US was made by their god, but also wanted to install the head of their cult as king of the US (because the united states didn't fight two wars to get rid of those) and eventually world.

If by conservatives you mean Americans who describe themselves as conservatives.... that's a ridiculous claim. I don't think I've ever met a Republican who openly wanted a dictator. I'm sure they exist, but it's not the majority view within Republican voters.

If you mean something else, please define what you mean by conservative.

They had that one banner that said something like "we are domestic terrorists." I think that's basically their platform.

The funny thing is that they did. They copied their 2016 platform - including language that denounced the current administration. (At the time it was originally drafted, Obama, but on reuse it targeted Trump.) They can't even copy paste properly.

Yes, this 58% Republican support isn't "Libertarians" finally smartening up and realizing the neocons want a police state, it's Trumpers who want the Trump Dynasty.

This is true. Green party was pretty big in my hometown and the local representative was great. But it was considered a "waste of a vote" to vote on them so everyone left leaning often voted for the liberals out of fear that the conservatives whould get in if they didn't.

Pasting my comment from further down the thread

False. It sends the message that if that major party wants those votes they need to align with the 3rd parties policies. You keep narrowly losing elections because voters don't support what you do, you'll change if you ever want to win again. People are more concerned about winning every election, voting for the lesser of two evils, then wonder why our candidates keep getting shittier and shittier.

Yes. My point exactly. I think young people get frustrated being told 3rd party is a wasted vote and do it out of a sense of rebellion. Real rebellion is attacking first past the post

Feel free to dismiss any new idea with baseless name calling if you want.

Unlike Forward Party, No Labels is actually funded and made up of mainstream US politicians and interest groups. No Labels is an establishment group pushed by right wing(republican) corporate interests. Forward Party is an outsider third party that is ignored by the established media outlets because they don't control it.

The linked video assumes the left right spectrum is communism vs capitalism which is NOT how it is used in the US. In the US left is dems and right is repubs to the general population. That is the meaning of Forward's Slogan in this context.

They are saying both of the democratic and republican parties are wrong and we need a different approach that does not conform to party lines. That is exactly what the OP shows.

No ones gonna fund a party no ones voting for. Not to mention they get federal funding money if they reach a certain vote threshold, a threshold we can hit to fix those problems you speak of. The numbers of voters are there, but if you like the duopoly just say that but you're not gonna make third parties viable by voting for the two parties that benefit from there not being large third parties. If you don't want third party choices to be viable sure what you say makes sense, but you cannot keep voting for the same thing and expect a different outcome. Its either stop supporting the duopoly or resign yourself to voting for a duopoly candidate for the ret of your life.

How does voting for libertarian candidates not diminish Republican votes? Everyone says Green Party is responsible for a milquetoast candidate with low approval ratings losing an election based on popular vote.

I don't see Republicans or Democrats blaming Libertarians for when they lose, even though they are the biggest third party, registered in all 50 states, and had more votes in general than other third party candidates since Ross Perot.

And libertarians get actual money from companies who support them, like republicans. Green party doesn't. I've seen more ads for them and "vote Jo Jo" than Green party support, and yet somehow the smallest party is to blame.

There is a reason Russia promotes the green party - it is because it splits the Democrat vote,

This is what happens when you watch CNN uncritically. They do not split the Dem vote, as green voters would never vote Dem.

It is funny that the Dems are the pro war party now though.

Biden isn't my guy. I don't like Biden. But Trump literally tried to overthrow our democracy.

It's no contest.

SCOTUS gave the only reasonable answer under the circumstances. The deadline for certifying the election is enforceable and the entire state has to be counted under the same standards, not a separate, different standard for places one candidate wants to challenge. Denying either of those would be a terrible idea for reasons that extend well beyond 2000, and if you accept both of those premises then there's no other real answer, as there wasn't time to recount the entire state under a new standard before the deadline.

The fallout of that same decision is why Trump had to give up on legal challenges against the election when he did in favor of protests and planning that exceedingly poorly thought out attempt at an insurrection.

Ralph Nader took enough votes from Gore to bring the election to a narrow enough race that the court could steal it.

If he'd dropped out near the end, when it was clear he wasn't going to get the 5 percent he needed, he still refused to put his support behind Gore, selling the lie that both parties are essentially the same.

Because they completely overhauled their party and transformed it from the inside. No way in hell Trump ever could have gotten elected as a third party candidate. But now he owns the entire party.

Just because they are evil morons doesn't mean we can't appreciate he there magnitude of the transformation.