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My favorite description of the Democratic Party is Woody Allen’s restaurant; you know the one, “such bad food and such small portions”.
The American political system is corrupt and both political parties are part of the problem and in my opinion only a massive citizen’s movement similar to the Civil Rights struggle could ever change it.
To expect the system to reform itself, is like looking for true love in a brothel or as the Spanish say, “you don’t go to an elm tree to pick pears”.
Still there are some significant differences that justify a tactical vote for the Democrats.
The first one is that the Democrats have no interest in keeping black people from voting. For me this by itself would justify voting Democratic.
Next; Democrats do not favor deregulated campaign financing, for the simple reason that there are more crazy Republican billionaires than crazy Democratic billionaires.
So, please, all those who four years ago thought they were voting for Mahatma Gandhi and have discovered that they elected a 1970s style moderate Republican, please stop pouting and keep Ayn Randian, Tea Party crazed, new-breed Republicans, Willard and Ryan out of the White House.
62 Comments
How about these new-breed Democrats, with their “necessary cuts” to Social Security and Medicare, expansion of the surveillance/war state, privatization of public school education and so on?
A 1970′s style moderate Republican looks pretty good by comparison.
If “so what” is considered a valid defense of the party, that’s just indicative of just how sorry they have become, and precisely why they are not worth voting for.
Then vote for a thrid party or write in the candidate of your choice or write in yourself. Just haul your ass down tot he polling place and exercise your right to vote.
It’s embarrassing and sad how some people, even at this late date and having full knowledge of the atrocities committed by Obama, are still finding any little reason to surrender to him.
Voting for a third party candidate is the very least one can do and takes the least amount of courage. That those on the left won’t do so says more about the state of the left in this country than it does about Obama.
How far we’ve traveled these past, four years, how little some have learned.
My sentiments exactly.
This isn’t a very difficult thing to do…
I’m reading Death of the Liberal Class by Hedges right now, and he spends quite a bit of time, nearly all of it, justifying why the ‘left’ in this country is worthy of contempt.
He would argue that Obama is just the latest of a string of ‘progressive’ sellouts that have destroyed the left since the beginning of the Cold War.
I am curious David, just what would the Obama have to do to lose your vote? I will hold him accountable, you will apparently vote out of fear. I will try to pull the democratic party back from it’s ever rightward tilt, you will encourage them to ignore you and do whatever the Wall Street gangsters, war profiteers, 4th amendment killers, and police state advocates want. Good luck with that, and welcome to our new fascist future where there is no difference in the brutal foreign policy of the two parties, where we are spied on by our own government, where corporations buy elections, and poor people die in the streets. I encourage you to vote your well educated conscience (provided you have one), but you can vote for whomever you want, at least for now.
John
I just have to wonder why FDL keeps front-paging this Obama apologist bullshit?
Backroom blowjobs and donuts?
This shit is getting old guys.
Obama is Romney, period. You can make up a load of shit to try and dress him up differently, but it doesn’t change who is in office for. The MOTU and the MIC.
Fuck Obama. Period
Still there are some significant differences that justify a tactical vote for the Democrats.
A classic example of damning with faint praise.
I would add “So what else is new”? I understand that there are a large number of people who are so hurt by Obama, they can’t see past their hate. But these same people in 2008 refused to listen to all of the cautions and warnings against supporting Obama that many of us were then trying to point out. They called us “racists” and “trolls”. Now they are similarly rejecting all reasoning for supporting Obama and calling everybody who argues for it “Obamabots” and even “murderers”. My, what a difference a few years and one rude awakening from a self induced coma make.
I understand that there are a large number of people who are so hurt by Obama, they can’t see past their hate.
Obama is a symptom of a much larger problem within the Democratic Party. Beginning with the Clinton presidency, the DLC and its successors have run the party and systematically dismantled the mechanisms by which dissenting Democrats can dislodge them from power. Obama and his coterie have systematically dismantled the dissent itself, either by co-opting them (Daily Kos) or dismissing them entirely (“f*****g retards”).
I see the party as beyond redemption. It cannot be changed from within. Earlier this year, I let my Michigan Democratic Party membership lapse and declined to run for precinct delegate. Time to move on.
Says someone who thinks I am a Republican plant.
Yeah, so all the cool people vote for the Democratic Party even though they might get something from their political system if they all voted (at once) for a different political party (NOT the Republican Party). Shut up and conform!
http://youtu.be/fRamB30E9mU
I think this is the case for a lot of folks.
I’m voting third party because I think it is my civic duty to do so, and as you say, it is the very least I can do to reject the organized crime syndicate GOP and their nice talking corporate counterpart Democrats.
Obama is a flat out fraud. And as that great philosopher “Forest Gump” said, “That’s all I’m going to say about that”.
Gosh.. a more polite version of the Stop Whining tactic that worked so well in 2010. At least he says Please stop Pouting..
I supported Kucinich. I then donated and worked for Obama.
I’ll be voting 3rd party this time, and since we’re being polite,
Thanks for your caring outreach.. not that it matters.
I never said you were a Republican plant. What I said was that many of the people who are urging us not to vote are then going to go to the polls and vote for their favorite Republican candidates. If you choose to apply that description to yourself, that’s your doing, not mine.
Democrats have no interest in keeping black people from voting. For me this by itself would justify voting Democratic.
For a different perspective David, you may want to read the Black Agenda Report. Two very incisive writers, Glen Ford and Bruce Dixon, have a much different perspective on the Obama presidency and what it has meant for black people.
http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/tired-old-so-called-leftists-give-same-old-excuses-supporting-obama-2012
The difference is that now, we have a proven track record of the broad scope of ways that Obama has not just not upheld his campaign promises and party platform, but has promulgated the worst of all guvmint policies across the board.
By pulling along people who identify as Democrats with him, he has ripped the soul of the party and its values asunder. The Democratic Party is dead. I’m pretty sure you didn’t see that coming, as much as you like to pat yourself on the back for your prescience.
I voted for him, and held my nose after the FISA vote. When he was elected, I was cautiously optimistic. He has proven quite thoroughly since, that ANY optimism was misplaced.
And again. Really, FDL? Front page?
I’m pretty sure you didn’t see that coming, as much as you like to pat yourself on the back for your prescience.
I thought the Democratic Party was on its last legs after the 2004 election, but it got a second lease on life thanks to public disgust with George W. Bush. In 2008 I supported Obama in the primary because he was the strongest challenger to Hillary Clinton, who we knew was firmly in the DLC camp.
What I didn’t expect was Obama bringing most of the Clintonite faction to run his administration. Or that he would completely dismantle Howard Dean’s model of party governance–which contributed greatly to the debacle in 2010.
You would have also known that about Obama if you’d been paying attention. The Democratic Party sucks ass. Stipulated. They are also empirically better in almost ever measure for Progressive causes than the Republican Party. By all means, vote third party if you wish. Personally, I haven’t decided what to do, just what I’m not going to do. I’m not going to sit it out and I’m not voting for Willard.
Nihilism being the pop term on some FDL comments threads these days using the words “so what” above is some irony in service of doing some more D Party boosterism and Obamapologia.
Being sarcastic seems to come easy too with some Obots/Dbots who like to mock those of us who may not want to vote for a warcriminal who kills innocents and destroys people lives because they got in the way of American Empire,Militarism and Global Hegemony.
Questioning the process of voting being abused/misused by Ds and Rs to prop up their rotted two party WashingtonDC regime is legitimate being both Rs and Ds have abused/corrupted Rule of Law,the conduct of justice and justice being done and have no substantial policy differences to do with or over American Empire,Hegemony and the MICC.
We Americans drop “regime change” on other lands and poeples like the UPS drops boxes off while those lands and nations do not seem to get to “vote” on whether they want Americans meddling and putting their lives into states of hellish torment. With self satisfaction seeming to be the base line for some(many?) Americans scolding and wagging fingers at Americans who are thinking or discussing not voting for Ds or Rs in view of the choice for POTUS in 2012 is between Obama or Romney who is being the real nihilist**? So what?
In view of what POTUS Obama and his WH are doing to Bradley Manning and seeking to be able to do to Julian Assange one needs to ask is it moral? Is killing innocents and displaying indifference while doing so moral? Or is the premise one that orbits around idea as long as POTUS Obama does not threaten you or yours what happens to those “others” while unfortunate is OK…a D POTUS is doing it…but just you wait if Mittens becomes POTUS … these same O&D bots will suddenly be aghast that Mitt is doing so. Hypocrisy much? So what.
** nihilism — rejection of all religous and moral principles
You would have also known that about Obama if you’d been paying attention.
Guilty on all counts of not having paid sufficient attention. Had I known, I’m not sure what I would have done. Edwards struck me as insincere, even before the Rielle Hunter story broke; and the rest of the field was damaged goods for various reasons.
I, too, will neither sit it out nor vote for Willard. In all likelihood, I’ll vote for a third party; in Michigan, write-in votes aren’t counted unless the candidate has filed an affidavit of write-in candidacy before the election. Before that law was passed, I used to write in the names of notorious criminals and unpopular sports figures if I was dissatisfied with the candidates on the ballot.
Sorry. Voting for an evil platform overall doesn’t justify voting for the Democrats. A vote for Democrats is still a vote for the rich and corporate America. This is that same old argument, voting for the lesser of two evils, that the Democrats rely on every four years. We need real change, not more of the same.
Yeah, the editors on FDL give this post front page but a post advocating Jill Stein’s candidacy is relegated to obscurity. Hey, Jane, what gives? Et tu, Jane?
For me the choice is easier. As I live in Texas, it’s probably not going to be close enough for me to feel guilty if I don’t hold my nose and vote for Obama so third Party seems to be in a stronger position for me right now. And though the Democratic Party seems hopeless, I’m focusing on down ticket elections this time around too. The only ones we can influence are ones we can access before they move into the bubble.
Granted. So what’s your plan? We know sitting out elections doesn’t work and we know that “punishing” the one major party only rewards the other one. Next?
So when exactly was this post given “front page?”
I looked back over two days and no sign of this post being anywhere near front page at FDL or MyFDL either one. And since the publication time stamp is 12:19AM this morning, I didn’t need to go that far back at either place.
Right there with you Tiger.As a fellow Michigander, if its got democrat or republican back of the name they will not be getting my vote.First time in 40 years of voting I will not be voting straight ticket for democrats.Obummer and Stabby can kiss the best part of my ass!
Sorry, Mr. Seaton, but I don’t vote for Republicans — even 1970s-style moderate Republicans who call themselves Democrats.
“I am curious David, just what would the Obama have to do to lose your vote?”
This. I have no sense that Mr. Seaton and other LOTEists have any inviolable boundaries that Obama and the corporate machine Democrats can’t cross. They’ll eat whatever shit sandwiches they are force fed and keep coming back for more. All they have to do (and pretty much all they will) is simply not be Republicans in name. Republicans in deed? No problem.
No, it’s your doing.
Comment #4:
http://my.firedoglake.com/cassiodorus/2012/07/13/the-cherry-pick-mitt-romney-movement/
Sure, because they know black people will vote for them by something like a 10 to 1 margin and they don’t really have to, you know, actually do anything for them once they’ve won the election.
Really? Is that why Obama declined public financing in 2008 and why he and most of the big shot Democrats spend so much time whoring for Wall St and corporate money?
I held my nose and voted for Obama in 2008 even though I thought even then he was a scumbag and a worthless piece of shit. Not doing that again. The Democratic Party can kiss my ass and kiss my vote goodbye. They had the Congress from 2007 unitl 2011 and the WH as well from 2009 – 2011 and FAILED to seize the moment to reverse the forces of economic inequality and injustice, worker’s rights, militarism, enviornmental degradation, erosion of civil liberties and the rush to dismantle the social safety net. This is because of their own complicity is these matters, their political and strategic ineptness, their corruption and their adherence to the same ideology that’s behind these things.
The Democratic Party needs to go the way of the Whigs. I’m done with them.
Ya’ll sound like a bunch of neoNaderists. Nader brought us Iraq, Citizen’s Unitedly Fucked, and every damned reason ya’ll are bitch’en about, etc.; aren’t we principled progressives doing so well after having vented our spleens and voting for Nader.
Protest votes are a way of fucking ourselves in a two party democracy. Reality is hard to face up to, but thats the system we got, like it or not.
“Father, they know not what they do,” applies. The underlying progressive consciousness continues to want to shed itself of presumed culpability by third party abstention votes on election day, because of principles. The purity of this conscience refuses to unite under a flawed banner. They feel then relieved from the burden of responsibility of the resulting consequences and naively say “it wasn’t my fault” by doing so. We therefore may wistfully refuse to accept our agency as having voted for Micky Mouse as a function of this psychological displacement of denial. Denial is a wonderful abstractive cover for so many of our flaws of character. But it doesn’t get us anywhere real.
We may feel better because of the placebo effect of third party, but suffer because of that obstinacy and never understand that we defeat our own principles by doing effectually nothing but conceding defeat by the terms of the completing the discussion that voting is. We want to prolong the discussion by voting for something else on principal. You take your piece off the political playing field, and your lack of two party position may change history to yield a Bush. But thats OK cause you weren’t playing the two party election game, your game was “three party oblivion” to the real political question of counting two party votes.
I shed my idealism in the reality of election day.
Ya’ll are cordially invited to idealistically pummel me on my post: “shut the f*** up and vote Dem.” I’m thick skinned. Sticks and stones,……and words from friends don’t hurt me.
And words from fools don’t hurt me. Anyone who can’t see by Obama’s actual actions and inactions that the next Obama Administration will be identical to a Romney administration in every way that matters is a fool, at best, in my ever so humble opinion.
Hmmm…I don’t see Ludwig today, sooooo…
How’s Spain treating you these days, Comrade Seaton?
I see Operation Jam Jar has succeeded. :-)
I suppose there is a foolish fence we’re confined within, or maybe its a maze. We’ve got to find a way out, that we agree on. We’re discussing a matter of which direction, thats all.
Wow. Right out of the box, we have someone standing up to the “apologists.” And for whatever reason, when the lame brains apologize for Barack Obama, they don’t seem to understand that they are apologizing for the fascist victory over the democracy that this nation once was. Thank you from the bottom of my heart, tongorad.
It don’t matter none if the fascist ruling our nation, for the benefit of Big Finance , Big Military, Big Insurers, Big Health and Pharma, Big Prison and Big Energy is a smiling happy fascist who allows women contraception and allows gays to marry. A vote for tha person is still fascism, and therefore that candidate is not acceptable to anyone understanding politics. Even if he happens to be a person of color.
I am sorry, but Nader did not bring us any of those things. The fact remains that Gore didn’t even try and contest what happened in Florida. It was voting activists within the Dem party that did that. And they were progressives to boot. And then the Supreme Court ruled in a trumped up manner, allowing George W to have that position of power. It came out in the New York times, September 12th 2001, that Al Gore had the vote majority in Florida. (Note the timing on that one!)
But the thing is, even if Gore had the back bone and had gotten himself the WH, he would have sold us out any way. The Nine Eleven tragedy still wold have been put in place -as a wimp like Gore always signs off on the type of “military leaders” and political planners that put the day’s events together. After all, Gore sold us out back in 1994, when he refused to allow a sensible direction for polciices to happen regarding the introductrion of new toxins in the pesticide market (As the Senate President he had the deciding vote on thematter.)
He has a history of doing as the Inner Establishment wants, and although many people see his video documentary about Global Climate Change as a slap in the face of Authority, it actually is a new theology that allows for huge amounts of power by the “environmentally concerned” governments of the world to utilize in further subjugation of their citizenry. And such “Authority” is not going to stop the purveyors of the climate change situation from still spewing forth their radiation, their CO2′s and their destruction of the planet via fracking. It will be the little guy who gets penalized while the Elite continues their destructive ways.
And at least some Republicans in name are campaigning to put the TSA back in its place, as a minor security force without the rights to detain us, or grope our infants’ private parts. While the Democrats are in on the gravy train that the Homeland Security forces offer up to them, just as surely as Cheney and other Big Shot Republicans are in on it.
So fuck ‘em.
That’s funny. The Rs love the security state as much or perhaps even more than the Ds. They’ll throw some populist rhetoric out to the base in the election run up the same as the Democrats but no D or R administration will ever roll back the security state machine. Bipartisanship is never more alive than when it comes to that.
More Nader bullshit? That election was stolen in multiple different and verifiable ways, and any democrat who says otherwise is a tool. Blaming a real American hero for a stolen election is absolutely lazy and pathetic… and therefore par for the course for some partisans who are without integrity. You think Gore had a right to Nader’s votes? He did not. Gore won the popular vote, he won Florida, and he won the election. Nader had nothing to do with robbing him off it. Keep blaming Nader, I’m sure republicans love that shit.
John
True Happieness Is Born Of Lowered Expectations should have been the title of this post.
Now John, we all know that the Evil Nader is responsible for all our failures and he singlehandedly brought down Building 7 at the World Trade Center, i have proof.
People are still blaming Nader for GWB? That’s some ignorance there.
Not to mention Nader’s responsibility for all evil including bad breath and the gout.
Nader didn’t cost Gore the election. Gore cost himself the election. He chose a finger-wagging whiny putz for a running mate; ran on V-chips and violent videogames instead of running as a populist; utterly disappeared during the last two debates; and distanced himself from Bill Clinton, which earned him zero Republican votes but held down turnout, especially among African-Americans.
Had Gore run a competent campaign, he would have won by 5 million votes, Nader or no Nader.
“The first one is that the Democrats have no interest in keeping black people from voting. For me this by itself would justify voting Democratic.
Next; Democrats do not favor deregulated campaign financing, for the simple reason that there are more crazy Republican billionaires than crazy Democratic billionaires.”
If that’s the best and all you have Mr. Seaton, you are not only a day late and a dollar short but really, really out of touch with what use to be the Democrats’ base of liberal support.
The Democratic Party is DOA.
Last rites anyone?
Mass suicide by heat death will solve all our problems, so let’s vote for the candidate who won’t do anything about global warming.
Oh Lord, here we go again with the Nader bullshit
You sore losers just can’t let go, can you?
http://www.disinfo.com/2010/11/debunked-the-myth-that-ralph-nader-cost-al-gore-the-2000-election/
David what you simply do not realize is that there are a large number of people on this site that want the republicans to accelerate this country into a political black whole and the sooner the better.
The whole idea of the US becoming an economic and social train wreck that even has doctors and lawyers and engineers eating out of dumpsters thrills them no end.
And then there are those who are convinced they will be able to form a truly progressive replacement for the democratic party and that the populace will flock to it in droves.
Which is about as realistic as attempting to turn Styrofoam into gold.
My mistake: I thought I was on another page…LOL! I’m on FDL far too much. Need to get back to work. Sorry
I guess I will vote for Jill Stein. Plan? Wish I had a solution to a corrupt electoral system, but I am only human. But voting for the lesser of two evils has been merely perpetuating the same state of affairs. The only plan I have for real change is civil disobedience on a grand scale: I applaud OWS. Other than that, nothing comes to mind. Sorry.
Please be kind enough to remove my posting in error @25: I had several pages open at once and posted to the wrong page. My sincerest apologies to the writer of this blog: this blog deserved front page coverage in my opinion. It really sucks when I am 64 years of age and I don’t know where I am half the time. My apologies to all.
So many great replies; I just wish I had “+1″ button. My thanks and support for posts 2, 4, 7, 8, 16, 24, and 31, among others.
David, I wonder what you’re drinking over in Spain. I can’t think it’s good for you, if diaries such as this are the result…
The truth is that the USA has one of the most stable and manipulated systems in the world, beyond many, perhaps most dictatorships… At this point either Romney or Obama is going to be in the White House… all the rest is pure onanism. Do I like that? No. But that is what there is. I expect very little from Obama, but Romney might be even worse than Dubya.
Maybe a few years does make a difference ;-)
I remember when you said things like this:
http://justsaynow.firedoglake.com/2011/10/07/late-night-fdl-us-attorneys-in-california-threaten-to-prosecute-medical-marijuana-dispensaries/#comment-5056
And this:
http://firedoglake.com/2010/12/01/obama-takes-blame-for-partisanship-in-washington-republicans-let-him/#comment-2261552
Personally, I NEVER supported that scum-bag, not in 2008, and I’m not going to do it in 2012.
My suggestion: Vote Green!
You are missing the point.
If enough Lefty discontent can draw enough votes away from Obama to sink him, then that will send a message to the next little Obamoid who wants to run for office.
Using the quote from the movie Dune: “He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing!”
seaton has spent his life voting for the lesser of 2 evils and trying to convince himself that somehow that doesnt make him evil.
guess again seaton.