There Is No Such Thing As A Wasted Vote

As the primaries await us after the New Year, I would like to put in a plug on the sanctity of voting and the urging that if you are not registered to vote in your locality, please do so TODAY. Also find out if you need to declare a party preference in the primaries if your state is taking part in one. Many states will not allow Independents to vote Democratic. You can always switch back, if you are a Green or Independent, but want to vote for a Democrat you actually support.

Now then, about this "sanctity" business. We all know we live under a regime that mocks this very notion of a sacred vote, as Florida in 2000 (and numerous times and locations throughout our history) have taught us. Now there is the Diebold question and potentials for new thefts and abuses. Still, none of these entities can take away what is written in ink and consecrated with sweat and blood in our revered Constitution. We have the right to vote, but above that, we have an obligation to exercise that right. We have a civic duty to keep the very ideal of this republic alive.

It disturbs me deeply when there is talk that if you support some candidates, that just because they are polling in the single digits, that somehow a vote for that candidate is "wasted". There is an unspoken urge to conform and go with the pack, ally yourself with the frontrunners. Forget your heart, mind, and conscience, and vote with who the largest plurality or the majority wants you to. This phenonemon exists in sports, in the workplace, and everywhere there is the whiff of competition in the air. It is an American flaw, to make the competition of numbers, just for the sake of numbers, triumph over the competition of ideas - the latter being the very essence of democracy. Allegiance to raw numbers, valuing quantity over quality, drives these very pressures to "get in line".

I am not shy about criticizing candidates with whom I disagree, nor handing out praise to them when deserved. But no matter how vehemently I may disagree with the candidate, or the candidate's supporters, I will fight to the hilt for their right to vote for that candidate, and would urge that they do no less than to vote their hearts, minds, or consciences either. There are lines even I will not cross. I am a human being first, before being an American. With that framework in mind, living within the guidance of the Consitutional compact, this humane and civic-minded American will never voice or give thought to such an inhumane, and disrespectful utterance, as "You are wasting your vote."

There is no such thing as a "wasted vote", with the possible exception of a vote not cast at all.

Yes, in the end, numbers do matter at the ballot box. A winner will take all. Your vote may very well be in a very large minority. But never, in any way, shape, or form, is that vote - any vote - less important, less valid, less borne of a citizen who cares enough about their country to want to change it, improve it, and make our lives better. Not only are all people created equal, all votes are too. Do not sit silently when someone disgraces the democratic ideal when they say you are wasting your vote. They not only disgrace that ideal, they disgrace themselves. Let us all vote with the mutual dedication that we all matter in these troubled times, and every one of our votes does matter, too. Every one of us matters.




Register to vote today!

*here*here*

:toast:

n/t

I'm very angry now that there are supposed "progressives" who want to take my vote away.

Who think they have the right to tell me who to vote for.

And worse.

This really tears it.

It's *MY* vote, and I get to use it for the candidate of *my* choice, not anyone else's.

That we should even have to be discussing this shows just how far some have gone towards totalitarian thinking.

Kanary

due to our electoral laws...we live in a system that encourages strategic voting....

If voting for your candidate would result in a candidate winning that would be worse than your alternative choice...you've wasted your vote...

For example...if your candidate preference between three candidates is A>B>C and support for these three candidates is:

C = 40% B = 35% A = 25%

by staying with candidate A, you will get a worse choice than if you switched and voted for B, not your best choice, but certainly better than C...

There are of course situations where strategic voting breaks down....

1) If the second and third place candidates were close in the polls...

i.e. C = 40% B = 30% and A = 30%...whose supporters switch?

2) You see no difference between the alternative candidates...

i.e. your preference ordering was A>B=C...this is what Greens claimed between Gore and Bush...

3) The magnitude of the district (the total number of seats the voter can vote on simultaneously) is greater than three...

i.e. City council seats with 4-5 seats "at-large" or Japanese district for their Senate....

4) If the voter do not have enough information about the candidates...

i.e. what is going on right now in many of the latter primaries, people dont have enough info about the candidates so dont know who to coordinate on....

A very good book that shows these results is by Gray Cox called Making Votes Count which provides actual data that shows how strategic voting works...

But it has very little or nothing to do with my points. You proffered this dry amalgam of numbers and percentages - a statistician's reductionist wet dream. A quantitative argument, which I see a lot of these days in GD. I even noted in my piece that yes, it IS a numbers game where winner takes all. I am aware of that aspect. But there is a dimension to votes that make them more than mere tools in a shell game, or percentages on the probability scales.

When I say "wasted vote", I am not talking about votes in their quantitative sense, to be cast with the calculation of chess pieces. I am talking about votes on a higher level - the expression of our will, a means of expressing our voice, or our wishes, our hopes, our expectations, and ideals. Yes, that brings a romantic, almost spiritual aspect to voting. The celebration of voting as an act of conscience need not be quaint or outmoded.

So if your vote is therefore "wasted" in a strategic, quantitative sense, does that mean your vote is meaningless within its highest purpose too? Does your voice not matter to you? I think it does.

Thanks for taking the time to craft that response, and I do mean that. I prefer a real discussion without too many "I agree! nt" posts. :-) (though who doesn't love those?)

:-)

I have a feeling I'm gonna be linking this thread in the future, LOL!

The general election is a different kettle of fish altogether. In the primary, vote your heart; in the general, vote your head. :hi:

I consider my vote in the primary an act of reasoned deliberation and the expression of my conscience and my highest ideals. My head and heart are sufficiently exercised.

Though often in the general my head has to tell me "Gawd, this candidate blows!" and my heart has a burning sensation requiring Rolaids. ;-) One day, I hope that isn't so, and I can vote both to their fulfillment in the general too.

Btw, I love Molly, but she can be wrong like anybody else. She would be the first to admit she can be wrong, which is one of the reasons she deserves admiration. :-)

Needed to hear it and it needed to be said.

:kick:

If you desire to remove Bush, then vote DEM. If you desire to keep Bush around, then do somthing else.

Dont count on others to pull through and defeat Bush for you-do it yourself!!

Ultimatley, it's up to whoever the DEM candidate is to inspire people to do this, not me!!

kick for da' zomby!

You rock!

Kucinich 2004!

:kick:

excellent! and there's no way i could have said it better.

:loveya:

a vote for Bush could be considered wasted, no?

...you'd have to be wasted to vote for Bush. :evilgrin:

:)