Well, let me say what I have said before. I actually do think it would
be better to not bother to vote rather than vote for a Democrat or
Republican, but the big trouble with that is that not voting is always
portrayed by the bourgeois news media and other bourgeois sources as
apathy. Since most people actually don't bother to vote I have had ample
opportunity to talk to many nonvoters and there is very little apathy
there. Oh, a few come right out and say that they just don't care, but
the very large majority express some kind of comment of disgust with the
Democrats and Republicans. It is unfortunate that a lot of them also
lump other candidates in with the Republicrats as just politicians, but
I tend to attribute that to ignorance. They generally don't like those
politicians though. This points up where I think the Revolutionary
Communist Party goes wrong. They urge everyone to not vote as a form of
protest. The trouble is that whether they have noticed it or not, most
people don't vote anyway and they refrain from voting without having to
be urged to do so by the RCP. It is never portrayed as a protest.
Perhaps it could be if there was an organized mass movement for not
voting, but the RCP has never made that a mass movement and, in fact,
they concentrate on other things. They organized the Miners Right To
Strike Committee, for example, but they never organized a people's
boycott the elections committee and have never tried. But even if they
did I think that is the wrong direction to take. Going to the polls and
turning in blank or spoiled ballots would have a lot more meaning than
just not voting, especially if a well publicized campaign was organized
to turn in blank or spoiled ballots. Even with a well organized campaign
it would be hard to tell who was not voting because of the campaign and
who were not going to vote anyway. But without the campaign against
voting turning in blank ballots are not going to get much attention
either. If, on the other hand, you do vote and vote for someone who has
no chance of being elected you are making a statement. You are making a
statement that you disapprove of the choices you are being given and,
depending on whom you vote for, you are making a statement that you
disapprove of their entire unjust system. But also remember why these
alternative candidates are running in the first place. None of them are
stupid enough to think that they might actually be elected. They are
using their candidacies as a platform to get out their ideas. It is a
propaganda strategy. You do a lot more good if you join and participate
in their campaign and promote the candidate and the candidate's ideas
rather than just voting for them. Now, lest I be misunderstood, I am not
urging you, Miriam, to do that personally. I realize that your health
and disability rather preclude you from doing much in that regard and it
just might be that casting a vote is about the most you can do. A
financial contribution might be a possibility, but it is up to you to
decide if you can afford to do that. But if your vote is not counted and
it is completely ignored then you may be right that it might be better
to just not bother to vote. After all, voting does take some effort and
if the effort is for nothing then it just might be better to not bother.
If you don't vote, though, I hope you will proclaim to as many people as
possible and as loudly as possible why you did not vote and make sure
that they know it had nothing to do with apathy. As for when votes for
alternatives to the Republicrats are reported, though, I am usually very
interested, more interested than I am in the vote totals for the
Democrats and Republicans. It is some measure of which organization is
resonating with the protest vote crowd the best. Unfortunately, it may
also be a measure of who has access to the most resources for
disseminating propaganda. That is, it may be a measure of who can get
hold of the most money. For example, I expect that the Green Party will
probably out poll most alternative candidates. That is simply because
they have access to more money. But when comparing the vote totals for
the parties that have roughly the same financial resources there mightt
be a measure of something else.
___
Thomas Paine
“One good schoolmaster is of more use than a hundred priests.”
― Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason
On 4/25/2020 4:41 PM, miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
I'm wondering what the point is of voting for a candidate if that candidate's
total of votes isn't made public. The vote would be a protest vote, a vote to
show where I stand politically and to show that I think that what the current
political leadership is doing, is wrong. But if the vote is private, if no one
knows about it, it has no effect at all. In 2016 I voted for Jill Stein . I
liked her and the party platform. The party was on the New York State ballot.
My vote not only made me feel good, it was a message to the Democratic Party
that they had a terrible candidate running on a terrible platform. I knew my
candidate wasn't going to win, but at least, my vote, along with others, would
be noticed. But if I write in the name of a candidate whom no one knows and
whose party isn't on the ballot, to me, it seems the same as not voting at all.
If they take Bernie Sanders' name off the NY ballot as Cuomo has said he will,
I would write it in as a protest. At least someone would notice and know whom I
was talking about. If I lived in a swing state, I'd vote for the Democratic
candidate. I wouldn't be happy, but I'd do it. There is a difference between
the Democrats and the Republicans. The Democrats respect science and education,
for one thing. They are also more humane in their inhumanity.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On
Behalf Of Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Saturday, April 25, 2020 3:32 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Jeff Mackler: Why I am Running For President
I don't know, but I doubt it. You should check with your election commission or
whatever they call it in New York. As to whether the votes are counted, you
might also want to ask your election commission about that too. A few years ago
in West Virginia there was an attempt to pass a law that would allow county
clerks to not count write in votes if they didn't want to. That law did not
finally pass, but the state secretary of state at the time, Ken Hechler, was
pushing for it. He was the one who was also always proclaiming what a proud
liberal he was. I argued with him on the issue both by calling in to a radio
talk show he appeared on and during the discussion period when he addressed the
state NFB convention. He seemed to be stunned that anyone would actually take a
write in vote seriously. He seemed to think that writing in votes was only done
as a joke. As for reporting the write in votes, I have seen that done in The
Militant, but it has been a long time since they did that. Most of the parties
that run their own write in candidates like to report their own vote totals in
their own publications. Sometimes those totals are hard to come by, though,
even for the candidates themselves.
You can pretty much forget about the bourgeois press reporting the numbers
though. Even if the candidate is on the ballot they are very reluctant to
report the vote totals of any candidate who is not a Democrat or Republican. I
do remember one time that they did, though. I have told this story before here,
but let me tell it again. Once the county prosecutor office became available.
It was for an unexpired term and there were less than two months left to the
term. None of the usual lawyers who would have filed for that office were
interested. The filing deadline came and went and no one filed. So it was
inevitable that whoever won was going to win by write in votes. At that time I
had a friend named Caroline who was a college student at the time and on a lark
she decided to run for the unexpired term of prosecutor. She did not file. She
was only doing it as a lark and she had no expectation at all that she would
win. She simply went around asking people to write in her name. A couple of
days before the election some lawyer announced that he would run as a write in
candidate to be sure that a responsible person got the job. The day after the
election the news media did report his vote totals. I don't remember the exact
number, but it was just under thirty votes. They did not report Caroline's
votes at all, but I started adding up all the people who promised that they
would vote for her and included myself and her too. The total came to just over
twenty votes. So I estimate that she lost the election by about five votes. If
that lawyer had not filed she would have gotten the surprise of her life when
she was elected as the county prosecutor. By the way, I have considered the
Socialist Workers Party to be my party for a very long time now. It has
actually been decades. However, the party just keeps taking turns that make me
very uncomfortable and the latest one of those turns was switching to a support
of Zionism and the two state solution.
So I hate to say it, but Jeff Mackler is actually looking to me like a better
choice than Alyson Kennedy. In 2016 I thought the same thing, but when it came
to voting I couldn't remember how to spell the name of his running mate and
ended up voting for Alyson Kennedy. I used to personally know her, by the way.
This time Jeff Mackler is running with Heather Bradford. I will not have the
excuse of not remembering how to spell her name. So I will likely be writing in
the names of Jeff Mackler and Heather Bradford. At the same time, though, I
feel a little guilty about voting against Alyson.
___
Thomas Paine
“One good schoolmaster is of more use than a hundred priests.”
― Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason
On 4/25/2020 1:47 PM, miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
Is his party on the ballot in New York State?
I wonder what happens to the votes for candidates whose parties aren't
recognized in the state where one votes. Are they even counted? If they are,
does the total get reported anywhere?
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Roger Loran Bailey
(Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Saturday, April 25, 2020 11:56 AM
To: blind-democracy <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Jeff Mackler: Why I am Running For
President
Here is a You Tube video of an interview with Jeff Mackler, Socialist Action
candidate for president:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zUcoOTI30E&feature=emb_title
--
___
Thomas Paine
“One good schoolmaster is of more use than a hundred priests.”
― Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason
