I would like it if we had 2-4 viable political parties in our country.

I would like it if they all agreed on the basic decencies.  That all humans are worthy of dignity, inclusion, health and consideration.

And once we all recognize that, we could have 2-4 viewpoints on how to run this country, how to manage our relationships with other countries, how plan for the future.

Instead, we are all fighting about the stuff I wish everyone could just accept as basic human decency.  And the net result is that the stuff about how to run this country, how to fund this country, how to make sure this country has a viable economy in the future, etc is being neglected.

No one talks much about how to fix the deficit.

Not much discussion on how to invest in and maintain our infrastructure.

Climate change is discussed in passing.

I want the politicians to work on problems that are slowly disintegrating the foundations of our lives but they won’t do that because they are slow invisible problems.  Instead we fight over what seems to me to be basic human decency.

No matter how you vote, you will be voting for Trump or Clinton.  A third party vote is still a vote for Trump or Clinton.

This is REAL Life.  And how real life works is that while we might want things, we cannot always have them.

Certainly you can vote for anyone you want.  However, voting for a third party will necessarily mean  that you didn’t vote directly for either Trump or Clinton.  This means that if you would ordinarily have voted Democrat or Republican you are hurting that party and providing a one vote advantage to the other.  Its simple math.

Your vote for a third party may seem like a marvelous way to protest.  But it has a real world secondary consequence.   No matter how you vote, you will be voting for Trump or Clinton. So if one of the candidates is standing on ground you cannot tolerate while the other one isn’t that can be bad news for you.

The third party vote will certainly be a statement to the particular party you are angry at.  But it is ALSO a vote for their opponent.  That’s just how the math and first past the post elections work.

The result is that most people vote strategically.  Because we don’t live in a magical kingdom where we all get what we want.  And in my life, I spend more of my votes voting against people than for them.  It’s the nature of our system.

You should do what you want.  But don’t do it imagining you will be changing much of anything.  3rd party voters have killed a candidate’s chances before and we still have this really broken system.

Politicians are heavily invested in this system.  Its rigged and so broken that it backs itself into the kinds of ridiculous choices we now face.  But politicians are the ones who control changing it.  We don’t.  They know we don’t.

We can certainly make them uncomfortable by not voting for them.  But the system of politicians as a whole, liberal and conservative is united in keeping the status quo.   So even if you managed to piss off your party by voting them out with a third party vote, you won’t change much.  Because the system itself is the thing they need to protect and it’s the thing that created current unpleasant choices that you hate so much.

They won’t change it.  It’s the teat they feed off of.  The most they will do is change the rhetoric or the window dressing.  But that’s not the real problem.  The real problem is that the system is not controlled by the voters but by the politicians.

And that problem does not have any solution that is better than the status quo.  Because without a violent overthrow I don’t see how you could so systematically change the way our government works.  And violence is not a better solution than just accepting what is.  Even if it were possible, which it is not.  However idealistic the 2nd amendment may be, the US long since passed the possibility of having its citizens overthrow its government.

So we are left with what is.  And we have to make the best choices inside this framework.

Please.  Stop.

We get it.  People who walk on the streets are one or more of the following:

1. Stupider than a ball of dryer lint.
2. Have souls that resemble a slimy dishcloth left under three days of dirty dishes.
3. Have a worldview that is eclipsed by earthworms.

Except No.   That is about the same as saying Reality Shows are REAL.  They aren’t.  We know that.

And neither are these on-the-street interviews representative of anything but a reporter finding the right person (ie stupid, bigoted or representing the viewpoint of reporter’s bias), properly editing that interview and putting  it on TV.

Had they found someone with a thoughtful well considered viewpoint, it would NOT be aired.  Because that is not the purpose of the on-the-street interview.

The purpose is to make the viewer feel better about themselves by comparison.

These interviews are NOT News.  They are providing self indulgent porn for our egos.  They provide no additional information about the events of the days, which is what News is supposed to be.  It’s not supposed to be entertainment or ego porn.  Its supposed to be providing information about current events.

But dissemination of facts about current events now represents about 20% of the News as it is shown to us today.  And the on-the-street interviews, which make such good comedy on Late Night Talk Shows, are just one of the pointless pieces of noise that fill up the other 80% of the News Show.

I wrote the following tweet last summer.

I certainly believed that.  It seemed utterly impossible that enough people could take him seriously.  There was a history of him running and dropping out when support was weak.

A lot of people dismiss the idea that he will win the election.  I think it is VERY dangerous to dismiss that idea.

He will win if people do not step up to the plate and vote AGAINST him.

Refusing to vote because you don’t like your options is both naive and irresponsible.  Because one of the options is very much better than the other, whether or not you agree with her policies or think she will make an ideal president.

She will NOT be the disaster area that Trump will be.  She will probably have an entirely forgettable term, with her only notable accomplishment being the first female President.

I imagine Bill will have more press being the First Gentleman.  He will be the show we all watch.  Because you know he’s going to make a clown car wreck of it.  Heck, vote for her just for that show.

But vote.  Because if you don’t vote and Trump wins, it will be your fault.

I was in the midst of writing a thoughtful piece about how in the US and indeed in all free nations, we have an opportunity to effect change through voting.  I pointed out how we are not oppressed like the people in many countries like North Korea and that means we need to vote and use our voting wisely.

And then I read this on twitter:

And I realized – we are not going to change.  Because we have been having this problem in slapped in our face for several years.  We had riots in Ferguson and nothing changed.  We have so much evidence that this is a problem and nothing has changed.  We have demonstrations, and prayer vigils and send messages to our representatives.  And nothing changed.

Voting is absolutely still necessary.  But the people we get to vote for also needs to change.  And that is a harder proposition all together.

We need candidates who are not influenced by big lobbies but by their constituents.  We need to get enough of them in there so that they make wise evidence based decisions about making radical changes in turning this country into an actual place of peace and justice  instead of just in rhetoric.

That doesn’t mean just changing how we police.  The police are the obvious symptom of an underlying disease that is plaguing this country.  Change means addressing the issues that lead to poverty and lack of decent education and therefore lack decent opportunities.  That means fixing the problem of our justice system that is so HEAVILY biased against people of color, is bloated with minor offenders who learn in a harsh environment that their only future is crime and poverty.

But where are those candidates who will address these problems with radical changes?  How do we get them to congress in enough numbers to make a difference.  It seems overwhelming.  It seems impossible.

And so probably nothing is going to change.