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You'd think midterms would be a great time to get your name out there and run high profile candidates to win House districts led by charlatans...
ranked choice voting (or similar)
If we could have both of these, it would be American democracy—only better!
I like Approval Voting for single-winner elections and Sequential Proportional Approval Voting. Approval is way easier than RCV in every sense (RCV is complex enough to disenfranchise minorities) and it gets more accurate results because it doesn't have spoilers (RCV actually does, they're just different than what you're used to).
Approval is great for third parties because their full support in the final results, which RCV doesn't always do. Those results are important because they influence voters in the next election, helping little parties build up legitimacy even when they lose.
It's currently in use in Fargo and St. Louis, and of course they're very happy with it.
Yeah, as long as we can get rid of lesser-of-two-evils voting, things would get a lot better.
Right; ranked choice seems to have a lot of momentum behind it. There are a lot of other possibilities with pros and cons. I don't think it's worth bickering too much about what makes the best one. I do know first past the post needs to go. If ranked choice is being pushed, I'll go with it.
Just gonna throw STAR voting into the rink for the hell of it. Any of these systems is better than FPTP and I would endorse any of them in a local push for better voting.
IIRC something happens if one manages to get 5% of the vote, which would enable them to more seriously compete the following election. So, the pitch is they aren't trying to win this time but for the election after - if they can get 5% this time. Didn't get 5%. Next election rolls around: rinse and repeat.
It's a pipe dream. In 2016 we had two of the most disliked candidates running in the big two, and an uncharacteristically decent looking candidate running for the LP. That was prime time for the LP to get that coveted 5% and start making wheels turn. They got 3% and remain on square one. We will not EVER see better conditions for a 3rd party success than Trump v Hillary v Johnson. Not with fptp.
If 3rds want to ever actually get their shit together, they need to work together for reform like ranked choice. Their differences in policy don't mean squat until then, so wake me up when that shit starts to happen. (it won't happen)
Ross Perot was the last time a 3rd party actually made some noise. He took 18.9% of the popular vote, founded the reform party, then withered on the vine.
In following elections, the Reform party would go on to nominate Pat Buchanan and Ralph Nader as Presidential candidates. It also ran Jesse Ventura for governor, and even Trump had a brief turn in there.
Not so much withering on the vine as being completely incoherent.
(If you don't know about Pat Buchanan, since he's been out of the limelight for a while, he was basically all the worst impulses of racist GOP voters back in the 90s. Exactly the kind of people Trump uses as his base now.)
Localist parties can probably win as well. I think there are some observations that can be made from UK elections, which also use first-past-the-post.
Not to mention, a third party did get 5%+ with Perot and the Reform Party. But I don't think Reform even exists anymore, and if they do, they've done a terrible job of making themselves known.
They've been trying their strategy of "get our name out during presidential elections and hit 5%" for a long time now, and it's clearly a losing strategy.
I mean tbf I've seen the libertarians and greens run those races too, it's just that being a third party under fptp bites those candidates just as hard as their presidential candidates.
Also having such a hopeless position means they're not actually accountable to their supporters, meaning refusing to actually try to build a movement doesn't actually hurt them.
Isn't it weird that people only pay attention to third parties every 4 years? Maybe that's why we only have two shitty choices.
Volunteer. Get educated. Quit blaming others.
Aren't you literally blaming others in your comment?
Third parties should be running House candidates and putting ads on airtime for them. You aren't going to win an election if it's based on people doing research instead of you doing heavy advertisement.
Third parties should try doing anything noteworthy to get attention. The parties and their candidates don't deserve anything intrinsically.
There's plenty else they could be doing... outreach in off-years, for example. Start on campuses building awareness and building the kind of word-of-mouth and grassroots supporters you really need for a campaign. Having your name on the ballot isn't enough. Having rallies isn't enough. You can't ask the people to come to YOU, and the media certainly won't give you any coverage... you have to reach out to THEM.
Third-party candidates don't have much money. They typically don't have corporate donors and dark money funneling in, and individual contributions simply aren't enough.
That is true... of a traditional campaign. But we live in an era where people can get millions of devoted followers by twerking on a webcam. A savvy third party that uses the internet effectively to build followers and then spreads into the greater population through word of mouth could conceivably work. Heck, it's not all that different from how Trump managed to build his base.
I'm not sure exactly what such a thing would look like for a third party candidate with some kind of scruples, but it shouldn't be IMPOSSIBLE.
Third parties should be running ~~House~~ grassroots candidates and developing a support system. That's how the teabaggers took control. Of course they had the financial backing of wealthy conservatives.
Yeah but like this you can vote 3rd party every four years and then do nothing else and then you can go on Lemmy and claim you're both anti trump and anti genocide and have the moral high ground.
chances are, they probably are, but corporate media is never going to give them any airtime so you never hear about it
In my state if a Democrat doesn't run for a seat. Chances are a Republican is running uncontested. I leave large parts of the state ballot blank because Republicans run uncontested ON EVERY BALLOT. Even presidential years. And while I rarely vote FOR anyone. I always vote AGAINST Republicans. Well them and Rand loving economic liberals pretending to be libertarians. Which is basically the same thing.
Those are perfect races for third parties to get into
Seriously. About half the races in my districts never have anyone running but one Republican. Hell there's been a few Statewide races where only one Republican ran.
Bernie is okay, though. I'm sure you hear less about all US candidates in general during midterms, especially when the average congressional district is unlikely to have one running every other election.
Bernie does it the right way. Build a base of support to influence people who will then influence the politicians.
Most politicians are going to make platforms based on polling numbers and a general sense about what the voters want. Kinda how things are supposed to work in a representative democracy. The politicians are supposed to represent the people when passing laws and setting policy.
As nice as it sounds in theory to be able to check a box beside the name of a person that agrees with you already, it's just not feasible because everyone has different ideas and different priorities. So you gotta check a box beside the person that's most likely to be sympathetic to your ideas and priorities (and actually has a shot of actually being a representative) and then make some noise to convince them they should do something about the issues you care about.
Bernie does it by basically replacing the local democratic party in his races though
He's an independent that acts as the 1st party
This is my point though. It should be a higher priority for running a candidate in every congressional district and running local ads for them.
Democratic socialists also have had a small but established coalition in the house and Senate for decades too.
That's because they're not in it to actually win. A number of them are in it to act as spoiler specifically, why else do you think Jill Stein still around?
The third party situation currently is inherently going to draw candidates that are not practically minded. Any one that might align with a third party platform but have any hint of practicality go participate with one of the two likely parties.
In some areas, it's not even two parties, it's just one of the two. In those areas, you'll see both left and right candidates in the primary for the practical choice, and the other mainstream party devolves into the same state as "third parties", with far out impractical people trying to run.
Election reform to make third party candidates viable would lead to more practical sensibilities in those third parties
Actually many of them do try that, it's just that they'll only ever relevant enough to reach a wide audience during presidential elections when more people are tuned in, disgruntled, and actively looking for alternatives before the cycle repeats itself.
I would not be surprised if a lot of money was funneled into third party campaigns during general elections by PACs of the two main parties as a spoiler strategy. I would be shocked if you tracked campaign contributions to the Green party and to Jill Stein in particular, and didn't find that most of it came from some Republican PAC. If Jill can siphon any votes from Biden, all the better for the Trump campaign.
The Democrats probably do it, too, except Republicans locked out dissent with the "Thou Shalt Not Defy Our (current) God, or we'll destroy your local race with vengeance next chance we get" tactic, and it works. Many Conservatives may disagree with Trump, but they're all terrified little bitches of standing up to him because they'll get dumped on an lose their jobs if they do. So there's fewer spoilers for Democrats to fund.
But I'd be real money that most of Stein's financing comes from conservative PACs, and that's why you only see her pop up out of here gopher hole once every 4 years.
There was just an article I saw today about Republicans helping Cornel West's campaign in Arizona
I would be shocked if you tracked campaign contributions to the Green party and to Jill Stein in particular, and didn't find that most of it came from some Republican PAC.
A lot of Russian money, too.
Slaps Table THANK YOU!
They're not simply 'third parties'. They are political parties organizing around every kind of issue, local or not, without any support or exposure and against the two major parties. What happens is they typically have to caucus with one of two parties anyway to not be fighting both.
Third party candidates and their voters are some of the most engaged political operatives out there.
Presidential elections are the only times the vast majority of people even look or engage in politics whatsoever. That's actually the rare point in time every four years where there is enough visibility for any party, even the two major ones.
Is it the only point in time where they're able to be visible, or is it the only point in time that they choose to be visible? I'm of the opinion that it's the latter, and it's because of a terribly flawed philosophy.
Third parties have been trying to gain visibility through presidential elections for decades, and it's been completely unsuccessful. They're arguably in a worse place than before, since Perot was able to get at least >5% with Reform. It speaks volumes that the third largest candidate behind Trump and Biden is RFK Jr, without any contest at all.
Let that sink in. A party that RFK Jr established at the beginning of this year is polling significantly better than the Greens, Libertarians, and anyone else. I wager the others combined aren't even more than RFK Jr. It's very clear that whatever they're doing isn't working. It doesn't matter how engaged their supporters are if they're pursuing an objective that has demonstrably been a failure.
If third parties were more effective then the screaming about them "stealing votes" that are supposedly owed to the two main parties would just be louder.
Just like the two main parties are not owed votes, neither are third parties owed votes. If a Democrat has to earn my vote, then so too do third party candidates. And they've done an incredibly poor job of doing so.
Don't get me wrong, you have a good point. I just find the third parties to be completely unserious and not at all focused on actually making a difference. I would prefer for them to be more effective and to actually try to earn my vote instead of just running on "I'm not the other two!".
It's my opinion that the FPTP system not only disadvantages third parties with game theory, but it also leads to batshit insane third parties that really aren't serious.
When third parties start winning races, you see states and other election institutions finding new ways to exclude them.
I'm reminded of the Commission on Presidential Debates, which was created to freeze out the League of Women Voters (who had been running debates since '72) by transferring governance of the debates to the heads of the RNC and DNC. This effectively cartelized the debate process.
After 1996, when Republicans blamed the third party contender Ross Perot of throwing the election to Clinton one too many times, the CPD raised the criteria for participating in debates to each candidate needing 15% support in national polling, functionally excluding all non-major parties.
But this pushed the more radical elements into the primaries, as we witnessed in 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020, and 2024. Long-shot candidates could find a podium on the stage with as little as 2% national support in the Dem or Republican primaries. The primaries have become a de facto third party venue, as a result. And this has created a crisis of "elect-ability" that party leaders are attempting to tame in their own way, by freezing out challengers through their own arcane procedures and rules.
It feels increasingly like we're going back to the old Smoke Filled Room model of candidate selection.
Also getting sued into the ground.