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View Full Version : tPF Again: Why I'm Voting For Stein, Not Clinton



IMPress Polly
10-07-2016, 10:07 AM
As a quick heads up, I've opted to make this a tPF thread. Here are da rulez: 1) No bad-faith posts. Bad-faith means irrelevant, stupid, and annoying to me. 2) No personal attacks on other members (especially me), including critiques of people's looks, career paths, etc. Thank you.

Sometimes people need reminders as events go on, so for the Hillary Clinton people, here's my issue with casting a Clinton vote:

While I would agree with you that the neoliberalism of Clinton and the alt-right fascistic politics of Trump are not equal, I disagree with any assertion that the two are opposites. The one thing led to the other. Decades of neoliberal policies of the sort that Hillary Clinton has supported, ranging from NAFTA to workfare to the repeal of Glass-Steagall to the Iraq War to the Libya War (to name a few that Hillary Clinton herself has backed), that have created an entire age of economic malaise and aggressive military policies that were not only criminally wrong in both a moral and legal sense, but which have also consistently failed to achieve their own demented objectives, have been crucial factors in the rise of the Trump phenomenon this last year. The alt-right phenomenon is, to a substantial degree, a reaction to these things. I am voting to address the disease that is capitalist imperialism, not simply to treat its worst symptom. A vote for Clinton is but a vote to revisit this same type of scenario in another four years. A vote for Jill Stein is a vote that points both the public to the solution, or at least in its direction anyway. (Besides, Clinton will win anyway.) Here's what I mean:

Stein calls for the elimination of corporate money from politics, the establishment of democratically-administered, publicly-owned banks, the replacement of our existing foreign trade agreements, an end to American imperialism (including the closing of all American military bases abroad and a cut of at least 50% to the military budget), tuition-free college education, an end to school privatization, a system of free national health insurance, publicly-owned utilities, worker-owned cooperatives, a $15 an hour minimum wage, a large-scale public works program to rebuild our infrastructure and retrofit homes, schools, community centers, and businesses with clean-energy technology, a moratorium on GMOs, the protection of public lands, water, and parks, a path to citizenship for immigrants, the establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to understand and eliminate the legacy of racism in America, a restorative approach to criminal justice that favors alternatives to prison time, and more. Contrast this with Clinton's record, the people she surrounds herself with (particularly her inner circle), and campaign funding sources.

Cigar
10-07-2016, 10:09 AM
Noted ...

Mark III
10-07-2016, 11:03 AM
As a quick heads up, I've opted to make this a tPF thread. Here are da rulez: 1) No bad-faith posts. Bad-faith means irrelevant, stupid, and annoying to me. 2) No personal attacks on other members (especially me), including critiques of people's looks, career paths, etc. Thank you.

Sometimes people need reminders as events go on, so for the Hillary Clinton people, here's my issue with casting a Clinton vote:



Voting for Jill Stein is a defacto vote for Trump.

Every vote that does not go to Clinton increases the possibility that Trump will become president. No amount of spinning can erase that FACT.

You give all the reasons to vote for Stein as if they actually mean something. If the Green Party was a well established party with congressmen and senators and governors, and even mayors and state reps, in it's ranks, at that point the Green Party might be a thing.

But none of that exists, so the Green Party and Jill Stein are a utopian fantasy. Progressives have to rid themselves of this pipe dream that they can effect political policy by running someone for president every four years who gets 1 or 2 percent of the vote.

Maybe this year, because of the publicity, Stein might get 3 or 4 percent, all of which will be helping to possibly elect Trump and a conservative Supreme Court for years.

AZ Jim
10-07-2016, 11:08 AM
Polly, kid yourself all you want but a vote for Stein is another Trump vote, and what impact did it have other than that----------NONE!

IMPress Polly
10-07-2016, 11:28 AM
While I recognize that there is a more or less set base for center-left wing politics in America at any given juncture that competition tends to divide up, I would argue that a Stein vote is affordable to the progressive (at least in most states), particularly under the current circumstances. Take my state for example. According to the most recent polling data out of Vermont (http://media.wix.com/ugd/3bebb2_dd659ad4faf34206969d7dbef07995e2.pdf), which dates back to early September when, nationally speaking, Trump was faring better than he is now, here's what the situation looks like:

Clinton: 47%
Trump: 26%
Johnson: 13%
Stein: 7%

You mean to tell me that without Stein's 7% of the vote, Clinton can't win in Vermont? You see how this is kind of a no-risk proposition?

We can increasingly say the same basic thing nationally since we now see Clinton pulling away with just a month to go.

Peter1469
10-07-2016, 01:52 PM
It is good to see people who can think for themselves and don't just vote (R) or (D) like sheep.

Cigar
10-07-2016, 01:55 PM
I honestly don't care what or why individuals Vote for, just as long as my Candidate Wins :grin:

Yea I know, I'm selfish. :grin: