#but the green party still got a lot of votes

[gayhenrycreel]

everyhing feels a bit shit right now, but its wonderful that so many people support the hīkoi. ACT is deeply unpopular right now. however leftists also need to get off their asses and vote whenever possible. dont forget the mayor elections. they have power in government and when you have leftist mayors youre more likely to get leftist MPs and then leftist PMs. if people stop collectively thinking their votes dont matter, we can actually make a difference. if your vote didn't matter they wouldn't try to get your vote

[kawuli]

you know, the thing that leaves me completely out of fucks for "don't vote" arguments, more than anything else?

the 2000 election

Bush won by Supreme Court decision. If they'd counted all the ballots in Florida he would've lost, but he successfully sued to stop the count.

We all learned what a "hanging chad" was. It was awful.

Less than a year later, airplanes flew into a bunch of big important buildings.

Nader got near record green party votes. Al Gore was the famously boring VP for Clinton, the guy who decided the way to win was to be a Democrat who acted like a Republican. Clinton and UK PM Tony Blair were the champions of neoliberalism.

why in the fuck would you want to vote for that guy? the dumb kid of the old president didn't seem too bad, anyway. he was a Compassionate Conservative! is that really so much worse than neoliberals?

it's hard to play alternate history with this stuff, but imagine if Al Gore had been president on 9/11. We probably still get a war in Afghanistan, everybody wanted that one except Congresswoman Barbara Lee, D-CA. I think it's a pretty good bet the US doesn't invade Iraq.

Can you imagine how much better off we'd be if instead of 8 years of a climate denier president we'd gotten the guy who wrote "An Inconvenient Truth"? If we'd managed even to do the wimpy version of cap and trade?

You can't KNOW these things. That was one Trouser of Time and we're down a different one.

But 537 votes in Florida made a hell of a lot of difference. I don't want to be one of the 600 or so people who were running late after work and didn't want to wait in another goddamn line.

Because you just never know what's going to happen

[you-need-not-apply]

you don’t even vote for the liberal party in your own country so stop judging others for not voting for Kamala

I love this ask because clearly anon has no fucking clue how politics in any country work. Lemme break it down:

In Australia, where I come from, liberal party = conservatives. They are not liberal, they’re mildly far right at best.

Also, how Aussie voting works is that you can still vote for third parties, as we don’t actually elect a prime minister. It’s a little confusing but to dumb is down (and yes I know it’s not completely acceptable just go with it)

Australia has multiple parties, notably are The Liberal party (right wing), The Labour Party (likes to be centre some what left mainly right, workers rights but voted against making price gouging illegal), the Greens (I vote for them just because we need green policy but they’re very far left wing), and like 40 other small parties plus all the independents.

How Aussie elections work is the people vote for people to get them seats in parliament, the majority wins and gets to elect a prime minister, they’re kinda like the kid who organised hide in seek and then didn’t play. Basically they have very little real power other than usual shit, they have to go through our Parliament House to get most stuff done.

And as Australia is still under British rule, we have a bunch on governors in each state and then a “head governor” in charge of says “yeah the colony is still there” back to England every now and again.

Also we can’t change our money without British permission. So every time we change something people hear make this big song and dance about it, which is hilarious considering they don’t give a single fuck.

But how does this allow for third party voting?

Let’s pretend there are three parties (only) the blue the red and the yellow parties. Blue and red want to make a ferry, yellow wants a train. People vote.

Now in America, you vote for the party and that’s your only vote. So if more people want the ferry, but because there are two options the vote is split. Boat wins majority vote, but the train would win because it has the most over all. Got it?

In Australia however, we rank our votes. My brain gone I thought it was 7 or 5 but I’m pretty sure that’s wrong, but it varies okay. So if I wanted a boat but I liked red party more than blue, I would vote 1-red 2-blue, 3-yellow.

Now red doesn’t get enough votes let’s say 20 people voted, 7 blue,8 yellow and 5 red: because I voted for 2 blue, and my first party (red) has been eliminated my vote now moves to the blue party, maybe some from the red party also did blue second and maybe some voted yellow second.

Let’s split the red party 4 for blue and 1 for yellow.

Blue has 11 and yellow has 9. Suddenly the ferry has won!

It’s a complicated system but it makes sure not a single vote is wasted, and as voting is compulsory here (thank fuck) it gives people a lot of leeway to fuck around. Hope this helped anon

[iizzeee]

Guys, I am begging you. Please please please please please PLEASE do NOT vote 3rd party, or not vote at all.

I get it. I really do. Biden’s handling of Israel has been, not gonna mince words, dogshit. Abominable. Unspeakably bad.

But we cannot afford to protest like this.

We don’t need Biden as president. We do need to keep Trump out of office. And to those who respond “well, I don’t want just the lesser of two evils,” please, for the love of god, grow the fuck up.

For one, why wouldn’t you want the lesser of two evils. It is, by definition, LESS EVIL.

“Why can’t we just have no evil, why isn’t that an option.” I really wish it was. Just as much as you. But it’s not. These are our cards, and we have to play our hand to the best of our ability.

Which brings us to two.

Trump is more evil. Like, so much more evil. We’re comparing apples and oranges here guys.

I understand that a lot of you might doubt that. The largest demographic of people advocating for third party or non-votes are in the 18-26 range. New voters, with one or no elections under their belt.

So they don’t remember.

Most of us (I myself fall under this age range) don’t remember 2016. The election, that is. They don’t remember how so many people protested Hillary vs Trump by going 3rd party or writing in joke votes, because they saw the two as equally bad. And Trump won.

Half of us don’t remember the Trump presidency. We’ve heard he was a weird, bad, bigoted president, but don’t fully grasp the scope of how bad.

So off the top of my head, here are some highlights of real things Donald Trump did while he held office.

- threw toilet paper at hurricane victims like he was trying to shoot a 3-pointer

- fired the man investigating him for election fraud

- called African countries “shitholes”

- appointed members of the Supreme Court who would go on to overturn roe v wade

- stole classified documents from the white house to hide at his resort

- tried to instate a Muslim Ban

- incited a insurrection to try and keep himself in office, and maybe hang his VP if there was time

- looked directly at an eclipse. Like no glasses, full on.

- fueled covid conspiracies. Also told people to “drink bleach” to fight the virus

- withdrew us from the Paris Climate Accord

- cofefe. Remember that? What a fun, normal thing for the president to tweet at 2am.

- employed literal white supremacists

- called Nazi’s “very fine people”

- got endorsed by the KKK, and refused to condemn David Duke

And that’s just what I can remember right now.

So if you’re angry at Biden about Palestine, please please please do not think for a fucking second Trump would be better. He would almost certainly actively be worse. He would give Netanyahu the green light. If you think Biden has used a loose leash, at least it’s some kind of leash. Trump would be all in. Full chips, flying to the Middle East to send in the bombs himself.

If you’re still hesitant, consider this last plea.

Things are bad. These shouldn’t be the only two choice we have, but they are. You can’t look at the menu, which is offering either bland soup someone spit in or actual rat poison and go “could I have some steak”.

You can order the soup and live to write a one-star review on Yelp, maybe call health inspections on the restaurant or contact the owners and say “you guys know your menu has only two options and they’re both dogshit. If you don’t add more, you’ll be unemployed soon.”

Or you can order rat poison and die.

If we elect Donald Trump in the fall, we will be eating rat poison. He has repeatedly said himself to be in favor of a dictatorship. He quotes Hitler. If he is put in office, the change we all want and so critically need will not be fucking POSSIBLE. Because with Biden, it’ll be hard, and tedious, and long, and exhausting, but at least it will be goddamn possible.

So, come November, please don’t order the rat poison.

Please just eat your shitty ass soup so we can live to get really angry about it.

Please.

[toaarcan]

I need the anti-voting crowd to understand that not voting isn't going to cause the Democrats to take a long, hard, look in the mirror and suddenly decide that they need to swing left to appeal to more leftists.

When these centre-left parties lose, they get more centrist. They try to broaden their appeal and make themselves as appealing to as many people as possible.

The example I'll point to is my local centre-left party, Labour, who are currently poised on the brink of one of the largest victories they've ever had. By the time you read this, it may have already happened, election day is today.

Labour have been drifting rightwards on several fronts for a while now. One of the biggest examples of this was the 1997 elections. After repeatedly failing to defeat Margaret Thatcher and then subsequently losing once to John Major, Tony Blair became the new leader of the party, and reinvented it as New Labour, adopting a much more neoliberal economic approach and promptly got a historic victory.

Now there are a lot of reasons why Blair won as hard as he did, and I don't have time to break them all down, but at the end of the day, their adoption of neoliberal economic policies worked out enormously for them. Not only did Blair romp to victory, he maintained most of his popularity afterwards, reigning for an entire decade before finally stepping down in 2007.

Labour is also a handy demonstrator of why they don't lean leftwards after a defeat, because they actually did try that and it failed spectacularly.

After Ed "Wrong Milliband, wrong Ed" Milliband's dismal performance in the 2015 election, Labour actually decided to try and lean leftwards again, and selected Jeremy Corbyn as their leader.

Unfortunately, Corbyn was useless. Many a Brit will accuse him of not even actually wanting to be Prime Minister, instead just wanting to sit opposite an actual PM and oppose them. They're probably right.

The 2017 snap election, called by Theresa May, should've been an open goal. May was embattled largely by her own party, many of whom were strongly opposed to her attempt at a moderate Brexit deal. She was an unelected PM, chosen by internal party mechanisms after David "Bae of Pigs" Cameron fucked off post-Brexit disaster. The massive, and ever-growing pro-EU voting block were entirely unrepresented. The Liberal Democrats, normally a bit of a thorn in Labour's side in terms of hoovering up more left-wing votes, were still trying to recover from the massive hit in popularity they took after the disasterous Tory-Lib Dem coalition. Blood in the water for any left-wing party worth its salt.

Yeah so Corbyn fucked it up and lost. While May only ended up weakening her position, losing 13 seats and dropping below a majority, the Tories still got their largest vote share since the 80s and held onto power for grim death.

Corbyn stuck around, still didn't get any better, and promptly lost the 2019 election in a landslide. To this guy.

People didn't vote for Corbyn. In the media, he was pilloried as a communist and an antisemite (and he did such a terrible job of fighting that second one that to this day I still have no idea whether it was true or just a smear campaign), and his determination to take the high road only made him look weak and avoidant to the public. His policies got little attention and his campaigning was likely deliberately weak, shooting for the role of opposition rather than government.

It also didn't help that the people for whom Labour wasn't Left Wing Enough still didn't turn out. They still voted Green or didn't vote at all.

To the party itself, though, the message was clear. They'd gone leftward, and it had backfired spectacularly.

Corbyn promptly fucked off at long last and was replaced by Starmer, who is, as expected, another milquetoast neoliberal in most regards. And now, with the polls open for the 2024 election, and Starmer projected to win by such a massive margin that the term "Supermajority" has been thrown around like it's an inevitability, Labour has been engaging in what's been called a "purge" of its leftmost members, with most of Corbyn's base, including Corbyn himself, being barred from running as Labour candidates and instead having to run as independents.

Now, that might horrify you as a leftist, but to them, it's a course-correction. Corbyn and co. represent an era of failure for the party, where a leftward lean cost them two elections.

To swing back around to American politics, if the Democrats lose because of voter apathy, they aren't going to take it as a sign that they need to appeal to the left. They're going to take it as a sign that their appeal wasn't broad enough and they need more outreach to right-wingers.

They already lost in part due to voter apathy in 2016, they didn't move left to compensate. They found the Most Neoliberal Average Establishment Guy they could, rallied behind him, and it partially paid off for them. They at least won.

You want a more leftist Democrat party? Not voting isn't going to get you that. In fact, it will most likely have the exact opposite effect.

[orionsangel86]

Good morning beautiful people! It is a happy day if you hate Tories :)

My Liberal Democrat candidate won in my area, the Lib Dems have so far gained 62 seats putting their total at 70 :)

The green party have now got 4 seats which is 3 more than they had before!

The tories have LOST 247 seats.

There is still a lot of work to do and labour will need to be kept in check, but with more Lib Dem and Green MPs in Parliament I am feeling very positive about that.

Now someone throw some more milkshakes at Nigel Farage and fuck the 21,225 people who live in Clacton who voted for that fucker.

Not gonna let that spoil my high though. Its been a very pleasing day.

[whalesforhands]

the gojo-geto household’s playtime!

“Would you like another cup of tea, Mr. King?”Nanako’s voice is pitched far too high, an attempt to act a flair of elegance to her words as crumbs of the cookies Tsumiki had baked linger by her lips.

“Oh, with pleasure, Princess Of Green Bunnies.” You watch with amusement as Suguru tips his cup down towards the girl, trying his best to move his admittedly larger frame around without knocking anything over. Your hands gently wiping Nanako’s face when she leans in closer towards you momentarily.

“Mama—“ She coughs, sputtering in her next words. “Mrs. Queen! I am perfectly fine!” She’s whining up at you as you only silently pat her head.

“Can we eat now?” Megumi— No, Prince of The Animal Kingdom, impatiently drums his fingers against the plastic table, staring down at the potato chips and corn snacks before him. Tsumiki tuts, lightly smacking her little brother’s hand. “That’s rude, Prince! We have to wait for the Princess of Stitches to give us the signal.”

Mimiko nods. “Thank you, Princess of Strawberries…” A shy tilt of her head towards her plushie before she clanks her plastic spoon against the plastic teacup.

“Ah! Mimi has an announcement!”

“I wanna eat…”

“Gumi, be patient.” A ruffle of his hair from the long-haired man to sate him.

“I want to thank you all for coming…”

There’s a trudge, before from within the large pile of pillows and blankets, emerged the domineering figure of he who cannot be exorcised, he who rises from the dead, he who kidnaps children and swallows them whole!

The Banished Demon King Who Rules Over the Banished Bad Guys!

(Also known as simply, in Megumi’s complaints of the too long title, The Demon King.)

Gojo Satoru’s boisterous laugh is heard as he uses his tall frame to tower over the tea party, the gasps of shock and horror music to his ears. “My, my! A wonderful tea party!” With a rude step forward, he plants his foot upon the play table, albeit with a bit of care as to not rattle it too much, ego and confidence radiating off of him.

“But it seems my invite got lost via the carrier pigeon!” He places a melodramatic hand to his forehead. “You tiny lot wouldn’t be so cruel to not invite me, would ya?” The glitter upon his paper crown glints underneath the lights as his eyes search the puffed up faces of his daughters and uninterested one of his son.

“You were never invited, cruel monster!” Several plastic utensils are thrown at him as he deflects them with his ‘evil magic’. (He turned Infinity on momentarily before turning it off again.)

You only watch with a pleasant smile next to Suguru, just happy to be a part of this whilst lightly clapping along. Geto’s stare moves to watch you, lips quirking up at the sight of you. He chuckles when he spots a bored Megumi at your other side, sneaking bites of the snacks now that the girls were distracted.

(Megumi wanted to play his console, but everyone voted for this first, so he did too, to the twins and Tsumiki’s delight.)

Satoru’s blanket that acted as his all-menacing cape is unwrapped from around him as three gazes of unwavering determination face him. “I see…” A glint from those sunglasses hiding the ever mischievous pair of blue. “Then I suppose a kidnapping is in order to placate my evil desires! WAHAHAH!”

You don’t even have time to react before you’re scooped up into a pair of arms, the half-eaten biscuit still in your hand as you’re thrown over your husband’s shoulder, his long legs carrying you away and out the door into the living room, cackling all the way as you begin to put on airs.

(This was not in the script.)

“Oh no~!” You let out a gasp for dramatic effect as you’re carried further and further away. “I’m being kidnapped by the evil king! Save me!” The smile on your face completely going against your words, finding it hard to get into character.

“Our Queen has been kidnapped by the evil curse! Oh no!” Nanako raises a foam sword as Tsumiki fixes the ribbons in Geto’s hair. “Quick, we must have an emergency meeting plan to save her!”

——

Gojo settles you down gently on the nearby couch, humming lightly as he sneaks a kiss from your lonely-looking lips. “Gotta play it up a bit, honey. You don’t mind, right?” His once discarded blanket is now upon your shoulders, lightly and messily knotting it to act as ‘binds’. “And so you won’t get cold.”

“How sweet of a Demon King.” You lean forwards to peck his forehead, swooning at him as starry blue eyes meet yours, nuzzling his face against you with a grin on his face.

“Special treatment for my loveliest Queen, of course—“

“Halt right there, evil doer!” Tsumiki has taken charge of the party. “You haven’t won yet, since you forgot our secret weapon!”

“Papa!” Nanako and Mimiko push forward a very compliant Suguru, his hands raised as the sparkly ribbons and bows in his hair attract the demon king’s attention.

“Hello~” Geto only simply waves with a smile on his face.

“Evilllllll BLAST!” His fingers glow red before immediately flickering out, Geto taking the ‘hit’, clutching his heart as he makes a show of stumbling around, before dropping to the ground conveniently right next to you.

“He defeated the King! He’s too strong!” Nanako is gasping in defeat for her siblings, falling to her knees as she acts troubled.

“This curse has more plans!! I eat children who don’t give their daddies enough love today!!!” Gojo gives a sneaky pat to the prone Geto on the ground next to you before he turns to face his defeat.

“Order of Sorcerers! Plan B!”

“RAHHhh- Ow! Hey!” He’s getting pelted by an onslaught of toy bullets as an arm is held up in front of him to defend himself, stray bullets bounce against his face and off of his sunglasses, falling to his knees as he’s sniped from a distance.

Megumi.

Mimiko rings the bell in signal as Tsumiki hands out the next orders. “Megumi has temporarily stunned the monster!” A thrust of her sword upwards towards the ceiling. “All troops! CHARGGEEE!”

“Since when did princes use guns?!” Satoru is adamantly taken aback, holding both hands in the air in surrender as the twins held his legs down in place, Megumi pointing the toy gun menacingly at him as Tsumiki held a pillow up over her head in victory.

“Admit defeat and set our Queen free, monster!”

And they descended upon the poor man like ants to a fallen ice cream scoop, running at him as they poked him with their foam swords, bludgeoned his face with pillows, as he squealed, simply letting himself get overwhelmed and laying in defeat as he continues to get pummeled.

They’re distracted. This is your chance.

“Are you tired?” Your voice is gentle as your head hovers above his, looking down into his lovely copper-amethyst gaze as black ribbons of his hair splay out against the carpeted floor.

He really does look like something out of a fairytale. You’re surprised he wasn’t asked to play a princess.

“My back is a little sore...” Well, hunching over a tiny plastic chair all day isn’t very healthy. “But I’m mostly fine, dear.” He makes it a point to keep his already soothing voice low, tinged with gentle reassurance and eyes blinking slowly up at you.

(He still has the very important role of keeping the roleplay alive, after all.)

“And how is my gorgeous Queen doing?” The act is temporarily dropped when a hand reaches up to cup your cheek, grazing over the skin as his stare holds your own, the background noises fading into nothing as he takes this moment entirely for himself.

“Kiss me?” A plead that you can’t deny.

You relent, a lean downwards that allows you to press a kiss to the man’s forehead, easing his stress and begetting the softness of his eyes, before pulling away.

“Mm. Good… But I prefer somewhere else…”

A loud crash.

“The monster has fallen!” Nanako arises victorious, socked feet standing upon Satoru’s prone body, heels digging into his chest whilst her twin sat upon his stomach as he feigns death on the ground, Tsumiki patting the defeated man’s arm and Megumi poking his face with a stray bullet as the grown man fights to keep the ‘dead’ act as a smile is a laugh away from twitching onto his face.

masterlist

Notes:

“Daddy! You can’t put the word ‘evil’ in front of everything and call it a day!” Mimiko has a small pout on her face as she looks up at the light-haired man, star-shapes carrots on her fork as she regards the figure with a narrowed stare.

You and Suguru both had to console the defeated demon king quite a bit, despite the fact that he had voluntarily taken up this role.

Gojo regrets buying those toy guns. They actually hurt quite a bit.

nvy’s aftertalk:

sorry guys i was playing minecraft and studying lol

[salvadorbonaparte]

Recently moved back to the US after living in germany for a bit, but I've been trying to keep up with german politics. Unfortunately I speak german at like an A2 level and don't have the reading comprehension to understand most news/memes/general conversation online. Would you be willing to just briefly explain the whole thing going on right now? I've sorta got the general idea from some American news outlets but I'm still quite confused.

Okay I'm probably missing a lot of Nuance as well but:

The current German government is a three party coalition between SPD, FDP and Green Party (traffic light coalition). Christian Lindner was minister of finance. As a FDP member he was a neoliberal piece of shit. He kept blocking government budgeting because he wanted to lower taxes for millionaires, lower retirement and unemployment benefits etc.

In a surprising turn of events our chancellor fired Lindner on Wednesday evening. He gave a speech that was absolutely scathing - for his standards. Our chancellor is known to have zero backbone or charisma and a monotone voice that puts you to sleep.

Now people find this pretty hilarious because 1) Lindner is a piece of shit 2) we've never seen our chancellor act like this. There's been plenty of memes about him being unemployed and several journalists have already asked him things like "will you apply for unemployment benefits" and "what do you think about people calling you Germany's cheekiest unemployed person".

But unfortunately the FDP didn't find this funny so now all other FDP ministers stepped back - except for one who left the party to save his job. This was also really unexpected and is also leading to lots of memes. Without the FDP, the coalition is broken and there's no longer a ruling majority. The current government will spend some time taking care of urgent stuff now and then in the beginning of next year there will be a "vote of confidence". A strategic vote of confidence will trigger a general election, which will happen next spring.

Unfortunately² the current coalition was not very popular in the first place and conservative and right wing parties are gaining lots of influence. We also have a new party called BSW funded by a former Leftist party member who is singlehandedly proving the horseshoe theory by being so leftist she's right wing. So there's a good chance the election will have pretty bad consequences.

But since it's been a really hard week for everyone we're all just enjoying making fun of Chrissy Lindner losing his job #unemployed.

If you want I can translate some of the memes as well.

Hope this helped!

[cazort]

I've seen a small number of people on Tumblr advocating for voting for Jill Stein, the green party candidate, and a lot of them seem to take for granted the idea that she is better than Harris. None of them really make a convincing case for her, they just seem to assume that she is, particularly on the issue of Palestine.

But here's the thing. I don't even think she's a good candidate. Like I consider her borderline unacceptable, whereas I consider Harris to be a genuinely good candidate. It's bad enough that if I were in a state like Maine or Alaska that had ranked choice, I'm not even sure I would rank Jill Stein above Kamala Harris.

Why don't I like Jill Stein?

Inexperience. She has only held one political office, the town meeting (like city council) of Lexington, MA, a city with population under 35,000. This community is an extremely affluent community that leans very far left; in 2020 nearly 81% of the community voted for Biden and under 17% for Trump. Interestingly, in this own community where she served as a local elected official, in her 2016 run she still only got 1.3% of the vote, so she isn't even popular in the one place she has the most experience. She has never held state- or national political office and she has lost every other election she has run in. Her lack of experience is related both to her ability to win (people are unlikely to vote for someone who lacks experience) and her ability to do the job if she were to win. And it's not unrealistic for independents and third-party candidates to get elected to bigger offices. There have always been a few in US congress and it would be more attainable to get into a state congress; a few green party members have done this recently: Shane Robinson served in the MD state house until 2019, Henry Bear and Ralph Chapman in Maine. One, Fred Smith, even got elected in Arkansas as a green party candidate although he later changed back to a Democrat. The point is that there are even people in her party who are more experienced.

Disregard for the consequences of her actions. She threw at least one national election, the 2016 Presidential election, for Trump, and we are still suffering the consequences. Jill Stein's actions contributed to outcomes including the loss of abortion rights, all sorts of horrible environmental consequences, all sorts of negative consequences for immigrants, and a long list of other problems. This scenario is fully preventable; it could be prevented for instance by calling on your followers to only vote for you in states with ranked choice and non-swing states, and then giving a conditional endorsement of the next-best candidate and calling on your supporters to vote for them in swing states that lack ranked choice. She could have made this call and prevented the calamity we lived through, but she didn't. This shows great irresponsibility.

Age. She is already getting very old; she is currently 74 which is only 7 years younger than Biden and 4 years younger than Trump. Age was one of my biggest objections to Biden, was a big factor in me disliking Trump, and is a major reason I think Harris is a big improvement. And Jill Stein is much closer to Trump and Biden in age than Harris. Age is a big concern for me because older people are likely to be or become out-of-touch on many issues and also may experience cognitive decline.

Platform. Jill Stein's platform is objectively worse (and weaker) than the national/global green party's platform. One of my favorite things about the green party is that they tend to take a systems approach to environmentalism, through things like carbon tax which work with the market rather than against it. In countries where the green party has a significant number of seats in the legislature, like Germany where they control 117/733 seats in the Bundestag, they often end up cooperating with pro-business parties like Libertarians and even the center-right party on some issues, and this makes them better able to achieve their goals. But Stein takes a more stereotypically liberal "tax and spend" and regulatory approach making her not much different from the mainstream of the Democratic party in this regard. I.e. she supported the "green new deal" which is supported by many Democrats and to some degree by nearly all Democrats. This approach makes it less likely she would be able to appeal to and/or cooperate with moderates and independents.

Lack of a realistic plan to win. There is a realistic path for an idealistic third-party candidate to win the presidency, and it is through getting ranked choice implemented in more states first, thus removing the spoiler effect. And it particularly through embracing TVR (total vote runoff) over IRV (Instant Runoff Voting, which Alaska and Maine use currently.) Jill Stein hasn't even mentioned TVR, and although she has voiced support for ranked choice, it is not a point that she emphasizes particularly strongly. She is not active in the Fair Vote movement which is the largest movement to implement ranked choice in most states. To me, this sends the message that she's not really in it to win, she's just here to make a statement.

She's not a serious candidate, not a good candidate, and not an acceptable candidate.

I don't say this lightly, but I think that if I wanted to, I could mount a more successful third-party campaign for the presidency than she has. I think I would be a better candidate for president than she is. And I think I could make a more realistic path towards those goals than she has.

And I don't even think I'm particularly good. I know other people who could probably even do a better job than me. This is not saying I or these other people would be good candidates. It's more saying how I just see Jill Stein as being inadequate.

And this is why I think Jill Stein is a really lousy candidate. She is not the idealistic third-party candidate to break us out of the two-party system.

And when you see this, you see that all the people pushing her as "the only good candidate" are really pushing anti-vote propaganda. They are trying to manipulate the left into throwing the election.

This election cycle we have a legitimately good candidate: Harris. She ticks all the boxes. She is younger than Biden. She is more progressive yet while being rooted in reality enough to bring in moderates. She has called for a ceasefire in Palestine, and has been critical enough that she's attracted ire and backlash from the Israeli hardliner and AIPAC-funded crowd. And her track record as Attorney General when you start scrutinize it, is surprisingly and refreshingly good. Go look it up and see for yourself.

[trainsinanime]

I’m rather hesitant to talk about US politics these days, but I see a lot of posts talking about why you should vote for Biden even if it’s through gritted teeth, and I think there’s an important aspect that people don’t pay enough attention to: The Trump Muslim Bans.

Executive Order 13769, aka the muslim ban or muslim travel ban or similar, was basically the first major thing Trump did in office. It was released on January 27th 2017, and it stopped people from certain muslim-majority countries from entering the US, effective immediately. The official reason was terrorist attacks, though there had been no terror attacks in the US by people from any of the named countries.

The whole thing was a massive shit show that led to massive problems immediately. The ban applied to people who already had visas to get to the US (not easy to get if you’re from a poorer country), who appeared at their destination and were suddenly no longer allowed in. It also applied to people who had green cards, who were now prevented from entering the US where they had made their home. Twitter was full of pictures of pro-bono immigration lawyers sitting on airport floors with their laptops. People from these countries who were already in the US legally had to cancel planned trips abroad since they would not be allowed back in. There were some anecdotal reports that immigration officers (who had no idea what was going on either) told green card holders that they had to sign a form to give up their green card, since it was no longer valid. I’m not sure whether anybody did. 

After a couple of days the ban was blocked by emergency court orders. Trump changed it a few times and got blocked by the courts again a few times, but in the end, some form of the travel bans, now with more exceptions for students, people with ties to the US, green card holders and so on, remained throughout his entire presidency. Biden revoked this last ban on his first day in office.

I strongly encourage you to look up news articles from the time to remember just how much of a shit show it was. Trump claimed to have consulted the various government departments before issuing it, which was a lie. The whole thing was just something Steve Bannon had made up. While parts of it got invalidated, it still caused massive problems for lots of people, missed life opportunities and so on, and many people were prevented from travelling to the US throughout all of his term. It was a cruel and racist policy, incompetently implemented.

So what changed since then? Has Trump gotten any less cruel or racist? It does not look like that. What has changed is the type of personnel he has access to. In January 2017, when nobody had expected him to win and many still expected him to retire almost immediately, he had no trained staff, just a set of crackpots, nuts and weirdos who supported him who were now in top roles.

In the time since then, the Republican Party has fully embraced Trump. The much-discussed Project 2025 is, at its heart, a list of people who are just as racist and cruel as Trump is, but who have proper trainings in bureaucracy, law degrees and such - people who can draft a version of this that would make it through the courts. Whether it’s Project 2025 or other similar lists or even no list at all: The Republican Party has fully agreed to fully support Trump in everything he does. He now has access to all the personnel he needs to implement his plans, and a blueprint for how to exchange even more people in the US government whose views he just doesn’t like.

The courts have also changed. The republicans in the senate ensured that Obama was barely able to appoint any new judges in his last few years in office, so there were a lot of vacancies for Trump to appoint when he came into office. And in that case, there was already a Project 2025-like list of conservative judge candidates for him to appoint. So the courts are way more conservative now than they were before.

We talk a lot about the Supreme Court in that regard, which overturned Roe v. Wade because of Trump’s appointees, and which recently ruled that the president can commit crimes in office and get away with it, like try to overturn the election, or as a frequently cited hypothetical example, use drone strikes or Seal Team Six to assassinate political rivals.

(Aside that probably derails the whole post: I don’t know why Americans act shocked at this, this is what drone strikes and Seal Team Six are for. That has always been their reason for existing. Nothing they did has ever been legal. Oh, it’s different when the president is doing it to US citizens on US soil? Is it really? Maybe legally, sure, but morally, is it really any different? This has nothing to do with the rest of the post, it’s just been bothering me that the go-to example for the weirdest craziest crime the US president might do is something that US presidents routinely do already.)

But it’s not just the Supreme Court, it’s all courts that are now much more likely to be on Trump’s side. So what changed between 2017 and 2025 is that if Trump tries another muslim ban, he will now have officials who can put the cruelty into the right legal language with the right waivers and exceptions, and courts that are willing to agree with him, in order to ensure that this time, they stay fully in place.

And that’s just one example. Trump’s reign has been full of cruel plans that were poorly thought out and drafted by people who didn’t know what they were doing. This time around, Trump has the people who know what they’re doing, and they’re fully willing to be as cruel and criminal as him. Whether it comes to environmental regulations, oil pipelines through native lands, LGBTQIA+ rights, foreign policy, all the things Trump tried to do last time but failed because he didn’t have personnel who knew how, are now things that he can do fully. And don’t forget that Trump did succeed with a lot of his goals.

I’m not going to tell you to vote for Biden, it’s your own free decision and I will pretend to respect that. It’s just an interesting bit of history to keep in mind as you decide.

[greatwyrmgold]

There's a lot of discourse around what leftists in the USA should do on election day. A lot of people think we should not vote for Kamala Harris (and either voting for a third-party candidate or abstaining entirely), but I disagree.

Lots of people point to Harris's bad decisions in the past and mediocre decisions promised for the future, but for pretty much every point, Trump has done or promised worse. Maybe there are some points where Harris would be unexpectedly savage and Trump would be unexpectedly kind, but it's exceedingly unlikely that this will be true on most issues. And if it is, the Supreme Court isn't going to give her as much leeway as it will Trump. Arguing that Harris would be overall worse than Trump (or even equally bad) is just counterfactual.

A more reasonable argument is that Kamala is bad, and withholding our votes would convince the Democratic Party to stop appointing bad candidates. I want to say "Did you forget 2016 already?", but a lot of people of voting age this election were in middle school when Trump was elected. I wasn't paying much attention to politics in middle school, either.

Back in 2016, the left did not turn out for Hillary Clinton. Voter turnout among the more left-leaning Bernie-supporting demographics was low, and votes for third-party candidates were high. The Libertarians got more votes than they ever had before or since (about 3% of the popular vote), and the Green Party got more than 1% for the second time (the first being Ralph Nader in 2000).

Did the Democratic Party adjust its strategy to appeal to the American left wing? No. They blamed the left wing for their loss, picked an even more right-wing candidate for the 2020 election. Their 2024 candidate is less right-wing than Biden not because Biden polled badly with socialists, but because his age and health started to make centrists worry, so they promoted his VP.

The US Democratic Party has demonstrated that they do not give a shit how the left wing votes. They'll blame us when they lose and ignore us when they win. If the left wants to influence American politics beyond the local level, they cannot do so by voting.

But while voting isn't going to change the world on its own, it's still a thing you can do. You can vote and also organize; voting doesn't take that long. Whether and how you vote is a separate question from non-electoral praxis. And if withholding your vote (or supporting a third party) isn't going to do shit, you might as well support the mainstream candidate whose policies are less terrible.

If you can vote, vote Harris.

[princemick]

It’s crazy that the American struggled to pick a good president. But I’m not shocked the American from my uni course struggled to understand why we were voting for people we didn’t support because we wanted Tory’s out. Like I did explain even though I believe in Green Party policies I will have to vote labour since my area is labour and I don’t want to waste my vote in case the tories suddenly grow in popularity in my area (they didn’t). Anyway he voted for independent even though he didn’t want trump to win because that’s what he believed in and he knew that was going to be bad he didn’t care.

I can only point to the deeply ingrained exeptionalism and individualism that the usamerican culture is almost built upon. I'm saying this while knowing I also live in a deeply ingrained 'me culture' but the us is so built upton the idea of your beliefs and your thoughts being valid that even in moments like this people can't comprehend not voting what you believe in.

here, people that are deeply far left, a lot of my friends, me, we votes for the center left party for the fear the right wing parties would win. even then they won but the center left party got a massive amount of more votes. not all but a lot of us put our principles aside, if that was good or bad idk.

i think it all has to do with the ideas you're raised with and even then. if all third party voters voted for harris trump would've probably still won. this is not a left dem problem, its a problem of the amount of usamericans that genuinely believe in trumps ideology

[amorphousblobqueen]

The evil has been defeated, for now. Good work everybody. Some disorganised election thoughts below

The tories won more seats than I had hoped but still, a massive loss, and it may yet get worse for them. So many big names lost. Goodbye Truss. Goodbye Moggie. Badenoch may still be in trouble because a lot of postal votes weren't delivered in her constiuency, so her result will probably get voided lmao

The Lib Dems did exceptionally well. 71 seats! A brilliant result for them, great voter efficiency

Reform came second in a lot of constituencies, especially at the beginning of the night, but they at least didn't get their 13. They have got 4 now though, which is 4 too many in my view. Farage in Clacton, 30p Lee in Ashfield, Tice in Boston, and what's-his-face in Great Yarmouth

The greens got 4 seats which they'll be delighted about . They and reform are now the same sized party. Guess which one the mainstream media will pay attention to

A big shake up in Northern Ireland. Sinn fein are the largest party techically, but not in practice since they don't take up their seats in westminster. Also appearances from Alliance, the UUP, SDLP, and the TUV, the DUP probably aren't too pleased right now

Plaid got 4 seats, and the tories have been banished from wales. Fuck yes

The snp got fucking trounced. Unfortunate, I quite liked them, but they'll probably bounce back

Lindsay hoyle the speaker keeps his seat, surprise surprise

Corbyn keeps his seat by a lot. If labour really wanted it that badly they should've put up a better candidate

A few other independents came in, scalping one or two from labour

Okay, now lets talk about the winners. Labour didn't win as big as I had hoped (not wedded to labour, just wanted to see the tories lose more). Congratulations to kier starmer. Despite the not so good shit that labour had said, and the shouting from some on the left, which I understand, I wish that he was more left wing right now too, he will certainly do a better job than the tories, and just because I gave labour the benefit of the doubt, doesnt mean that I'm not intending rn to criticise them if they do not deliver. They have a lot of work to do on so many fronts. Trans rights, gaza, workers rights, electoral reform etc. Keep pushing them to do better

[jyndor]

I'm not gonna punch left ever. like yes do I have both strategic and ideological disagreements with some leftists? yeah obviously since leftist infighting and disagreement is the feature not the bug.

I'm still not saying I'm voting for kamala but I do think she will be a better opponent than trump. I believe in strategic voting so tbh if your district is a swing district, if you are in a swing state, I think voting democratic is smart because they are at least able to be beaten into some concessions from the left when we are organized. one big issue is the liberals who see any criticism as support for the republicans, and they're gonna be annoying as hell but I do think more people are aware that the democrats suck now than they did during the obama years.

that said, it is totally understandable for people in the global south to be hostile to any us president. and it is reasonable for them to hate us for anything we do politically because all these freaks have done material harm to millions of people globally. so I'm not offended as a white queer us american woman that a third world maoist might hate that I am considering voting for kamala harris. it's cool, they're not wrong to be angry with us americans' selfish politics.

and at this same time imo there is no real path forward for a third party candidate in the us. and it's deeply frustrating to me that so many amazing activists use their time and resources on what is to me a herculean task, running for president as a third party candidate and not even for a party like the greens which has name recognition. I'd rather they focus on local politics and even statewide politics, where they have more of a chance. I also don't think they're wreckers though, I just don't agree with their strategies. and they can call me a liberal or whatever for saying that, that's fine whatever lol I'm not going to punch leftists doing important work.

it is one thing to disagree on strategy, even on ideology and politics. but to assume that they are not genuine in their politics... it's just gross and dismissive. you do not know what you're talking about. I don't love the PSL for a few different reasons but I respect the activism they do, and I'm not gonna disrespect leftist activists doing far more than I ever will, even if I don't agree with everything they do.

tumblr is full of white liberals who might in fact have access to financial resources that many others do not have, and that's important for us to understand because it does impact how we view politics. it does. it's so easy for you vote blue folks to call ANYONE who criticizes democrats bots or russian ops or whatever. it does you no favors politically. you do not want to negatively polarize potential allies by constantly treating them like they've got ulterior motives for not supporting the democratic party.

but most people who for instance supported the uncommitted campaign and who were working to get biden out of the race all these months are likely doing so because we WANT to vote against trump. not that everyone in the free palestine movement is a democratic voter or even is in favor of electoralism, but a lot are in the states. so... it's weird to me that liberals treated us like ignorant wreckers who don't care about abortion or queer rights or voting rights etc, or somehow PALESTINIAN RIGHTS LMFAO I mean I'm trying to stay nice and call these libs racist cunts for speaking down to voters of color in particular but that's what it is.

do you really think the people who are the most tapped into politics are not going to vote??? really???? some won't but most will. especially those in swing districts. do you think that someone like me, who has been politically active since I was TWELVE, does not understand the utility of voting???

as always, your job is not going to be speaking down to people so politically engaged that they are threatening to WITHHOLD THEIR VOTES BECAUSE OF FOREIGN POLICY. IN THE UNITED STATES OF NOBODY GIVES A FUCK ABOUT FOREIGN POLICY. they're doing the work you should have been doing this whole time. you will have to sit with your complacency at some point.

your job is going to be getting off your ass and convincing everyone you know who is not registered to vote because they don't care about politics or don't like politics or whatever that they need to be invested in our political system.

bad news: you will not do that by shaming them for being ignorant or apathetic.

good news: a lot of people are very easy to get on board with shit like rent caps (which biden was just talking about the other day, 5% caps on rent federally! that's amazing and would help so many people - we should pressure kamala to adopt that policy) and reproductive justice. a lot of apathetic people care about this shit, they just don't know how it impacts them or where to start engaging with this shit.

do not pull the smug liberal shit, do not speak down to them, meet them where they are at! ask them about the things that they are bothered about, things like potholes and shit. that matters to people. get them registered, drive them to the polls. you will do more good than shouting at lefties on tumblr dot com. otherwise you're just preaching to the choir.

[daughter-of-sapph0]

I'm curious, how does refusing to vote for Biden help? I've always held the opinion that until we fix the system voting for a third party isn't helpful. Is the refusal to vote for him just to pressure him into calling for a ceasefire or actually committing to his campaign promises? If so then why is that worth the risk of Trump getting re-elected where things will only get worse for everyone? Apologies if this came of as insincere as I am being serious and would like to better understand your position.

you're at least attempting to ask a question. I mean, you're still a cunt about it, but I'll play along.

basically, checking a single box once every four years does next to nothing. it doesn't matter who I vote for because I live in a very blue state that's voted dem for every election since Clinton. one singular additional green party vote won't lose dems the election or anything

what will change things is being involved in your community. sit in for a school board meeting. visit events at your local library. get involved in your city's local government. organize protests and marches. volunteer at a homeless shelter or kitchen. start a community garden. participate in boycotts and strikes. meet people in your community, and make it an actual community.

(I'd also recommend other things which tend to lead to more direct change, but I'd probably be put on a watch list).

I'm not saying "don't vote". in fact, do vote. but don't JUST vote.

I've lived through some of the most divided and two-sided elections in us history. and I'm still pretty young, so I've only voted for one presidential election so far. so forgive me if I seem a little bit jaded and fed up with the "vote blue no matter who" bullshit. because no matter who the president is, it won't make any real change. there'll still be genocide and famine and war and covid and bigotry. you can't just rely on Genocide Joe to magically fix everything for you if you ask him nicely enough.

you need to actually do something that matters a lot more than checking a box. and that's what the vbnmw crowd doesn't understand.

anyway, if you didn't read any of that and just got mad and the meme making fun of y'all, then I'll leave you with this little logic puzzle:

if not voting for biden is basically giving a free vote to trump... then by that same logic, not voting for trump is basically giving a free vote to biden.

[marble-running]

Aight place your bets now, how's the general election going to pan out?

Not enough options for a minor party win and opposition, but I think that's unlikely enough that it's not too much of a loss for the poll.

Also, reminder to uk readers that we need photo ID to vote now, you can apply for a voter authority certificate via the government website.

For anyone interested in uk political lingo:

Currently the uk is undergoing the build-up to a general election, in which we elect our government.

We have three major parties: the Conservatives (they've been in government since 2010), Labour (they were last in government from 1997 to 2010) and the Liberal Democrats (they were last in government as part of a coalition with the Conservatives from 2010 to 2015). The Lib Dems are still considered a major party despite having been in considerable decline since the coalition.

We also have a lot of minor parties, the most prominent of which (at least to my knowledge) are the Scottish National Party (who are still considered a minor party despite having more seats than the Lib Dems), the Green party and the Reform UK party. These parties generally don't get a lot of seats (they get a lot of votes but our voting system sucks ass) but can still influence policy, mainly through the popularity they have with the public (Brexit was in part thanks to the popularity of Reform).

[None of these parties, besides the Conservatives to a small degree, have any presence in Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland's got a pretty different system.]

Parliament is divided into the government (the ruling party, currently the Conservatives), the opposition (the largest none-government party, currently Labour) and the other none-government parties and independent Members of Parliament.