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Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • Are you telling me that you consider "no u" to be too low of a form of discourse for you? You were all about it earlier, what happened?

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • That's very true, but none of the people who have replied to me are from .world so I don't see how that's relevant.

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • I don't agree that that's an "of course." There should be discussion of specific local races in a general politics community. Like I said, presidential votes only matter in a handful of states. If you add up the populations of swing states, I'm sure it's higher than any individual state, but there are still some pretty big states where millions of people live that that aren't included in that. And yeah, everyone is affected by the presidential race, but everyone is affected by congressional races too. If you want to say, let's say 90% of the content should be on the race that's relevant to people living in Pennsylvania, Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin, and maybe North Carolina that's fine, but if the rest of us have to see their content all the time, then they shouldn't mind if they have to see like 10% of the content relevant to the people who live in some of the other 44 states.

    And to be clear, this isn't something I'm saying about Lemmy in particular. Go anywhere in America, from the deepest red state to the deepest blue state, and ask about the latest story-of-the-week about the presidential race, and people will know about it and have an opinion on it and care about it. Ask them about local races, and they'll be far less knowledgeable far less invested, and will probably try to fit it into a framework based on the one race they actually care about, even if they can't affect it in any way.

    There would be so much more potential to cut through battle lines if people would go like, "OK, fine, you don't like either candidate, you don't have to vote for them. But do you mind if I ask what state you live in? Maybe there's someone running for congress or governor who's more to your tastes. I'd be happy to look into who's running and discuss them with you."

    But nobody wants that shit. We want the battle lines, we want the group identity, the team sports. We don't want to do research about boring shit nobody cares about, we want a constant stream of engaging news stories and hot takes that we can all experience together, as a culture.

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • Do me a favor and tell the middle school kid who's giving you all your quips that if he keeps trying, he'll get there eventually.

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • I'm rubber, you're glue, what you say bounces off me and sticks to you.

    If that's the level of discourse you operate at, I can join you there, I guess.

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • No.

    By the way, quick question, would you say that you don't like me based on who I'm voting for in the presidential election, regardless of how I vote down ballot? Because it kinda seems like you're proving my point here.

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • "Advising people to vote in" is not the same as "caring about" or "paying attention to."

    Is there any mention of specific candidates? Any passionate arguments over the details of specific races? Any discussion of political theory or historical precedent or anything like that in that context? Has anybody called someone a Nazi because of how they're voting for down ballot?

    No. Because what people care about and pay attention to is the presidential race, unless you're some kind of weird nerd or responsible citizen or something.

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • I've never voted for a major party presidential candidate in my life. It has never cost anyone anything, because I used to live in a deep red state and now live in a deep blue state. There's a better chance of helping a candidate hit thresholds that would qualify them for things like campaign funding, then there is of Tennessee or Illinois being the pivotal swing state. The vast majority of Americans are in similar situations, there's only a handful of states where your presidential vote matters at all.

    Despite this, and the fact that I've voted for Democrats down ballot, liberals hate me, and are always trying to fight me over it. Why? Because the presidential race is the only thing anybody cares about. For all the countless, identical debates over the presidential race, I've seen virtually no discussion on here of other elections. Culturally, your take on the presidential race is how your political identity is defined. That cultural tendency is so powerful that it can even bleed into foreign countries.

    The more people focus on my presidential voting behavior, which has no potential to affect anything, the more it reaffirms that such behavior is important. The reason that people care so much about my vote is not because they care about the outcome, it's because they want me to display a sign of loyalty, to bend the knee, to conform to their norms. But if everyone's going to treat it as an expression of identity, then, all else being equal regarding the outcome, it would be better to define myself according to what I actually believe. The fact that people get big mad over someone voting third party even in an extremely solid red or blue state is all the more reason to do it. My vote doesn't affect your life at all since it's totally irrelevant to the outcome, so stop obsessing over what amounts to a personal decision.

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    i need an rv, and lab equipment, and a helper
  • I can see how an RV, lab equipment, and a helper might help, but you don't actually need any of those to do OF.

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • Neither does yours.

    Of course. That's why I cited a bunch of actual evidence and examples that aren't dependent on my personal experience.

    It’s only your personal experience that leads you to believe that it’s all for show.

    Is it? I don't recall bringing up my personal experience in that matter at all, or bringing up that matter in the first place. Nothing about my personal experience seems relevant to that question, it's not as if I have firsthand experience with politicians in Washington that I'm using to determine whether they're trustworthy or not.

    Most people don’t know about legislation that has passed, forget about proposed legislation being a thing that will influence voters. So why would they bother proposing legislation they don’t really want in an effort to bamboozle people who don’t even know about it?

    Now this is just silly. Are you suggesting that performative legislation never happens? It happens all the time, especially during election seasons. Just because not every person hears about ever minutiea doesn't mean that nobody ever hears about anything or that it can't influence voters. You're literally using it right now to try to influence people.

    We can talk about whether this particular example is performative or not, but to rule out the entire concept of performative legislation categorically is ridiculous.

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • It sounds like you're basing it entirely off personal experience. But your personal experience probably doesn't give you a representative cross section of Americans.

    The Greens also got 1/3 of the votes in 2020 as 2016, both times being about 1/3 of the Libertarian party.

    There's also, like, some pretty big rifts in the right, between the old school establishment and the MAGA crowd. There was tons of infighting over the speaker and whatnot. Trump himself was obviously controversial, and I mentioned the threat of him running third party. If Republican voters would just line up to vote for anybody, the establishment would've never allowed things to splinter to the degree they have, they'd kick people out of the party and the voters would go for whoever they offered instead. I don't see how any of that is explainable if what you're saying is true.

    I feel like part of that narrative is just seeing the right run shitty candidates and seeing right wingers vote for them, but that's because the voters have different values and preferences. They still care quite a bit about the things they do care about, and break rank when they don't get their way, and much more so than people in the left do from the numbers I'm seeing.

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    Trying to build viable third parties by voting for them in presidential elections is like trying to build a third door in your house by repeatedly walking into the wall where you want the door to be.
  • Right wing people tend to be subservient and just fall in line and vote Republican. People on the left tend to be less pragmatic

    People are always saying this, but is there actually evidence that it's true? The Libertarian Party regularly gets more votes than the Greens, so if anything it seems like the opposite is true. Ross Perot got the most votes of any third party candidate in history, and in both the elections he ran in, Bill Clinton won. In 2016, Trump refused to rule out the possibility of a third party run if he didn't get the nomination, and it appeared to be a serious possibility.

    So is this claim just based on vibes or what?

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  • Genocide in a Teapot

    Before I begin, I have a confession: until recently (until today, in fact), I was a tankie. But this morning I just woke up and realized everything I believed and everything I'd been saying was wrong, and my critics were right about everything. And so, I have decided to completely and totally adopt their way of thinking.

    The above image is an example to illustrate how my thinking has changed. You may be familiar with "Russell's Teapot," a thought experiment from Bertrand Russell where he imagines that someone says that there is a tiny, invisible teapot, floating out in space. He argues that while such a claim cannot strictly be disproved, it can be dismissed without evidence because there is no evidence to support it. The burden of proof is on the person making the claim. He goes on to explain that while he could not disprove the existence of God, he still considered himself an atheist, because he did not see sufficient evidence for the claim of God's existence to be credible.

    In my previous (tankie) way of thinking, I would have agreed with this idea, that claims made without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. But I now understand that this made me a Bad Person. Suppose that, as in the beautiful diagram I drew in MS Paint, the claim is not only that the teapot exists, but that inside of the teapot, there are a bunch of tiny invisible people who are geopolitical enemies of the United States and they are committing genocide against innocent people. Again, before, I would have said that that only makes the claim more implausible and would require extraordinary proof. Now, I realize how wrong I was, and I can only say that I deeply regret and apologize for my statements. The existence of the teapot can be proven incontrovertibly, by the following logic:

    1. If you claim that the teapot does not exist, you are denying that the genocide inside it is happening.

    2. If you deny the genocide is happening, you are a genocide denier and therefore a fascist.

    3. Fascism is wrong.

    4. Therefore, it is impossible to correctly deny the teapot's existence.

    As a brief aside, I should mention that in addition to my political conversion, I have also experienced a drastic change in my religious beliefs, as it is now trivially easy to prove that God exists. According to the Torah, God flooded the world, wiping out virtually all of humanity, including countless ethnic groups. To deny the existence of God makes you a genocide denier and a fascist. However, it should be added that to worship God is genocide apologia, which is also fascist. The only non-fascist belief, which is necessarily correct, is that God exists and is evil. Moving on.

    Before, I believed that it was ridiculous for the US to spend as much on the military as the next 9 countries combined. I wanted to slash the military budget to fund domestic spending, schools, hospitals, making sure bridges don't collapse, helping the poor, etc. I see now how wrong I was. The Genocide Teapot exists, somewhere out there in space, in fact, there could be countless numbers of them out there. Therefore, the real progressive thing to do is to further cut domestic spending and have everyone tighten our belts so that we can produce as many missiles as possible, to be fired out into space indiscriminately, in hopes of hitting a Genocide Teapot.

    However, we must also consider the possibility that these teapots could be located here on Earth too. Teapots are a form of china, which is a very suspicious connection. Clearly, the US must be permitted to inspect every square inch of China in search of these invisible teapots, and refusal to comply should be considered an admission of guilt. But we should not, of course, limit ourselves to China. Perhaps there are Genocide Teapots in Russia, or Brazil, or Germany, or Canada, who knows? I do, because to deny that Genocide Teapots exist in all of those places is genocide denial, which is fascist and wrong.

    In conclusion, we should bomb every country in the world simultaneously, including ourselves, and anyone who disagrees with me is a war-loving fascist.

    Thank you.

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    www.pewresearch.org Most People in 35 Countries Say China Has a Large Impact on Their National Economy

    Large majorities in nearly all 35 nations surveyed say China has a great deal or a fair amount of influence on their country’s economic conditions.

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    www.sixthtone.com How Cooking Oil Became a Red-Hot Food Safety Issue in China

    Chinese authorities start investigating revelations that companies are transporting fuel and cooking oil in the same trucks.

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    Trump's foreign policy doublespeak

    >President Trump kept America out of new wars and brought thousands of brave troops home from Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, and many other countries. Joe Biden has undermined our military readiness and surrendered our strength to the Taliban.

    When Trump pulls troops out of Afghanistan, it's "bringing thousands of brave troops home," but when Biden does the same, it's, "surrendering our strength to the Taliban." He brags about "keeping America out of foreign wars" while at the same time bragging about assassinating "the world's number one terrorist," Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, which was an extreme act of provocation.

    This is taken from the issues page of Trump's campaign website, and there are several more statements relating to foreign policy, frequently and boldly contradicting each other. It's a perfect example of the "If By Whiskey" tactic. So what's actually going on here? Well, to understand the reasons for this equivocation, we need to analyze the foreign policy positions of Americans.

    Broadly speaking, people fall into one of four camps: Idealist Hawk (liberals), Idealist Dove (libertarians), Realist Hawk (nationalists), and Realist Dove (socialists).

    Idealist Hawks believe that US foreign policy is driven by benevolence and spreading freedom, and the fact that it repeatedly fails to do so (Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, etc) is explainable by a variety of excuses. Generally, they are more interested in current events and easily persuaded to support intervention based on seeing a bad thing happening, without a broader analysis or explanation of the situation or how things have played out historically.

    Idealist Doves also believe that US foreign policy is driven by benevolence, but they see that as a bad thing. They are generally right libertarians or hold libertarian values, they see war as another example of wasteful government spending as it tries and fails to improve people's lives, which they generally don't see as a valid goal in the first place. Being idealists, they are still rather easily duped into supporting war and militarism, often, they will support a "night watchman state," with police and the military being the only legitimate functions.

    Realist Hawks are nationalists who believe that states pursue their own material interests and are right to do so. They are incapable of distinguishing between the state's interest and their own. Some few are rich enough to actually receive benefits from US foreign policy, but most just root for America in the same way that they might root for a football team.

    Realist Doves, which I am a part of, do not believe that US foreign policy is not grounded in benevolence and does not benefit the people it claims to be helping, but also (generally) that it doesn't benefit the majority of people at home. We see it as being driven by and for class interests, and are opposed to the class it benefits.

    Trump's foreign policy equivocation, and his "America First" slogan allows him to appeal to both the Idealist Doves (libertarians) and the Realist Hawks (nationalists). He can't consistently take any line on any specific thing. If by Afghanistan, you mean a disastrous nation-building exercise, wasteful government spending, and endangering our troops for the sake of helping foreigners, then of course Trump opposes it. But if by Afghanistan, you mean exerting American strength, intimidating Russia and China, and weakening terrorists to keep America safe, then of course Trump supports it.

    In reality, to the extent that Trump has coherent beliefs at all, he is a Realist Hawk, a nationalist, and his record reflects that. But part of the reason he was able to get anywhere was because he was able to triangulate and equivocate well enough to dupe anti-war libertarians.

    Unfortunately, in American politics, the conflict is generally between Idealist Hawks and everyone else. This is part of what allows the nationalists and libertarians to put aside their differences (the other part being that libertarians are easily duped). Realist Doves are not represented anywhere, the Idealist Interventionists consider us Russian bots along with everyone else who disagrees with them on foreign policy (regardless of how or why), the Idealist Doves are extremely unreliable, and the Realist Hawks may see the world in a similar way but have diametrically opposed priorities.

    tl;dr: Trump's halfhearted antiwar posturing is an obvious ruse that only an idiot would fall for, but painting everyone skeptical of US foreign policy with the same brush helps him to sell it and to paint over ideological rifts that could otherwise be potentially exploited.

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    "Soulism" is a dangerous, existential threat to humanity that must be stopped

    What is Soulism? Soulism, also known as anarcho-antirealism, is a school of anarchist thought which views reality and natural laws as unjust hierarchies.

    Some people might laugh at the idea and say it's not a serious ideology, but this is no laughing matter. If these people are successful, then consensus reality would be destroyed and we would return to what the world was like before the Enlightenment. What did that world look like? Well, you had:

    • Ultra-powerful wizards hoarding knowledge in high towers, reshaping reality to their whims, with no regard for the common people

    • Bloodthirsty, aristocratic vampires operating openly, and on a much larger scale than they do today

    • Viscous, rage-driven werewolves terrorizing the populace, massacring entire villages with reckless abandon

    • Fey beings abducting children and replacing them with their own

    • Demons and angels waging massive wars against each other with humans caught in the crossfire

    Fortunately, out of this age of chaos and insecurity emerged a group of scientists dedicated to protecting and advancing humanity by establishing a consensus reality and putting a stop to these out-of-control reality deviants.

    Before, if you got sick or injured, you'd have to travel across the land through dangerous enchanted forests seeking a skilled faith healer or magical healing potion. But with consensus reality, easily accessible and consistent medical practices were instilled with the same magical healing properties. Once, if you wanted to transmute grain into bread, you had to convince a wizard to come out of their tower and do it, and they were just as likely to turn you into a newt for disturbing their studies. But thanks to consensus reality, anyone could build their own magical tower (a "mill") and harness the mana present in elemental air to animate their own "millstones" to do it! These things were only made possible by consensus reality.

    Now, I'm not saying that this approach doesn't have it's drawbacks and failures, and I'm not going to say that the reality defenders have never done anything wrong. But these "Soulists" want to destroy everything that's been accomplished and bring us back to the times when these supernatural reality deviants were more powerful than reason or humanity, and constantly preyed upon us.

    So do not fall for their propaganda, and if you see something, says something. Anyone altering reality through belief and willpower, or any other reality deviants such as vampires or werewolves, should be reported immediately to the Technocratic Union for your safety, the safety of those around you, and, indeed, the safety of reality itself.

    Thank you for your cooperation.

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