Wanting an end to needless slaughter, healthcare and working equipment sounds reasonable. I am glad there are reasonable voices on Lemmy.

I am probably missing a lot of information on Israel, but continued learning is important. I recently learned about the USS Liberty incident in 1967. I am not sure how Israeli’s could mess up that bad. There are still individuals maintaining the incident was deliberate. Who knows? Troubling history abounds.

People have different reasons for being on Lemmy. Examples are looking to feel validated or to pick a fight. I think these folk also existed in ye olde times. Maybe the attention economy is amplifying specific behaviors that would not have been amplified in the olde times.

Being fair, I usually come to Lemmy to argue. I am probably part of the problem.

The vote is worthless outside of swing states. May as well vote your conscience when fptp and Electoral College enshrine disenfranchisement.

Informative. Well written. Seems like the short version of my Intro to American Politics class at Uni. I classified myself as a social democrat back then. I was told I would get more conservative when I was older. Now I classify myself as an anarchist. Not sure what went wrong.

I am grateful local debates are posted online. Instead of listening to music at work I listened to the debates. Living in a one party state is unfortunate. The opposition tends to have similar political convictions to the incumbent.

Agreed. Voting shouldn’t be the only activism we are involved in. My comment was about solidarity against the oligarchs that can decide to make life harder for people they deem icky.

Republicans and Democrats were unable to stop legislation from the Judiciary with Roe v. Wade and later Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. Super PAC’s donate multiple lifetimes of dollars to Presidential candidates in a quid pro quo system protected by the first amendment under Citizens United v. FEC. Americans outside the oligarchy will never exhibit their influence.

If oligarchs find your existence icky, they have the power to remove your “right” to exist. You lack the power to prevent it. Instead of thanking anyone, I suggest we take the power back. Punch up.

Harm reduction voting makes sense in swing states. How is voting third party useless in a non-swing state?

Tell them that the Nazis never really went away […] And we’ll never rest again until every Nazi dies

• The Day The Nazi Died by Chumbawamba

What is socialist about GPL?

Being forced to open source seems like a pyramid scheme. Better examples of socialist and libertarian politics are licenses like MIT or BSD. They embody use without damage.

Stallman seems to have a flawed understanding of hierarchy and power. He exhibits such in the infectious GPL and pedophillic political takes. I purposely avoid GPL or derivatives when considering libraries.

Sanders or West would be better candidates. I admit ignorance on Stein’s relation to Putin. I mentioned her since she is the Green Party candidate.

What are Biden’s progressive accomplishments? I remain unconvinced Biden is left or progressive. I hope you can help me see my shortcomings.

The best of the Biden Administration’s work has been coalition building for Ukraine. That work is fatigued by support for Gaza. Support for suppression of student protests is not progressive. Infrastructure seems to be a corporate bailout. Handling of COVID was roughly the same as under Trump. Waiting for pandemic fatigue and the virus to become endemic ended the War on COVID. Wages are not keeping up with cost of living. I am against gun control, so that failure is fine.

Swing state voters decide elections. Since I am not one, voting against Biden is not equivalent to voting for Trump. My vote will not swing the outcome in my state.

That’s informative. I haven’t paid much attention to her. I know she is the Green Party candidate.

Move Biden left in 2020 became just take Biden again 2024. I will keep the language US centric. Democrats are surprised they are losing progressives by appeasing conservatives and moderates. A better progressive option is Jill Stein or Dr. Cornel West. Would be surprising for a coalition between Democrats and Greens.

Becoming familiar with other ideas is beneficial. There is nothing wrong with being a Democrat, Social Democrat or Libertarian. Real people hold these political ideas. My transition over years was Democrat since I opposed hawkish Republican imperialism, but I rejected corporate power, so Social Democrat, but I rejected hierarchical power, so Anarchist. Through reading I know Pacifism meshes with any of these ideas. I have never been a Pacifist, but I applaud anyone that takes the time to explore politics even if we do not agree.

Being able to have conversations with people around you is important. Reading theory from other politics helps. Most people around me consider themselves conservative. They say talking points like “I’m for small government”. Having read Libertarian texts like Nozick’s “Anarchy, State and Utopia”, I can discuss the minimal state as a Libertarian idea. I can then transition to “Nozick’s minimal state is not small enough”. In my area this approach opens conversation more than banging a drum about being a Democrat, Leftist, Communist or Anarchist.

Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. While having other successes, he was unable to carry out the Poor People’s Campaign. Was violence successful in removing the voice of Martin Luther King Jr.?

Learning to explain math to a computer has been a major blessing.

I may change my vote for different candidates or a different voting system. I currently support Cornel West. Biden was not a great candidate in 2020, but I was convinced we could move him left. There has been an “always D” tone on Lemmy until the recent debate.

Beyond voting there are more issues to work on like: building community, mutual aid, cardio, survival skills and marksmanship.

TL;DR: I’m not voting for Biden. I will be a spoiler if that’s what you call it. The police response to protests is an example of policies Biden wants to keep funding. Biden and Trump can both be bad leaders.

Aside: Voting is entertaining, but work on your cardio. Build some communities. Life is going to get harder for working folk.

I understand the spoiler effect in first-past-the-post voting. Avoiding a voting system subject to the spoiler effect requires a rated voting system. Major reform is required to remove the spoiler effect from the voting system in the USA.

There are other logical problems with the spoiler effect in the USA however.

First, the popular vote is divorced from the Electoral College vote. Thereby, even if Tiger gets 15% of the vote the Electoral College representatives for that portion of the population may vote for Leopard.

Second, there is an assumption Tiger voters would vote for Leopard or Gorilla if Tiger was not an option. Voter turnout in 2020 was 66.8%. That means roughly a third of people chose not to vote. There is an argument to be made that this is also a spoiler, but combined that block could shift the outcome in Tiger’s favor.

Third, “I’m not the other guy” is not a political platform. Biden pays lip service to protecting American Democracy which seems to be a conservative stance to maintain a voting system favoring the wealthy. Codifying Roe v. Wade is great, but could have been done at any time in the past. Separation of powers requires a Legislative branch that would work on such issues. Funding the police does not solve policing which leads to responses to protest like the George Floyd marches or recent campus violence.

I am sure there are other reasons to vote for Biden. The FTC fighting corruption under Lina Khan is one. Corporate bailouts opposing the neoliberal order, like CHIPS and Infrastructure, could be another.

I am unable to vote for mass murder. I am unable to vote for corporate bailouts. I am voting for Tiger.

Best case, a third party wins and starts to dismantle an empire. Realistic case is Biden or Trump win and my vote had nothing to do with it. Biden and Trump are both bad leaders. Deporting or silencing dissenters is bad leadership. I’m still not voting for Biden. Nice try though.

I referenced a news story in which the parachute on an air dropped aid package failed to deploy crushing people underneath.

Genocide is not ethical. Voting for genocide, but less, does not change the ethics of genocide. Part of the coalition that elected Biden in 2020 will not vote for him again due to his support of genocide.

The options for such voters are:

1. Being complicite in genocide
2. Voting third party or not at all

I understand the two party system created by first-past-the-post. I understand third party candidates are unlikely to win. I understand Democrats are rightfully nervous. If Democrats are nervous enough, they should do something to change the minds of voters that will not vote for genocide.

There is a flaw in making a collective choice individualistic. Helping others is a moral thing to do and I was there in 2020 even though peanut butter sucks. Individually, I will get a sandwich, probably with peanut butter.

However, this crate landed on Palestinians. Helping the people under the crate seems important.

I understand needing to eat the sandwich. I also understand making a collective first-past-the-post choice individual is a flawed argument.

However there is an individual component to saying I really can’t eat peanut butter. The decision then becomes stand your ground (no peanut butter), compromise (just a little peanut butter) or protest (full peanut butter; see you in the ER). The claim is the compromise is best.

How do we reach a point where we no longer need to compromise on peanut butter?

What’s the Democrat’s end game with Project 2025? Is it keep voting Democrat or else you get Project 2025? How can we convince the powerful that genocide is bad?