90 Days, 90 Reasons (to reelect Obama)

Reasonsnsns-2

90 Days, 90 Reasons is a compelling Web project where each day, an interesting thinker contributes an essay on why President Obama should be reelected. First up was Death Cab for Cutie's Ben Gibbard on gay marriage, followed by the likes of environmental activist Adam Werbach on fuel efficiency standards, Roxane Gay on hope and change, and so on. From the "opening salvo":

This initiative will provide daily reasons—concrete, factual, plain—to re-elect Barack Obama, and will also provide likely outcomes of a Romney presidency. Articulating these reasons will be a wide range of well-known Americans, their ranks proving that there is, indeed, a growing movement that acknowledges not only that Obama needs four more years, but that we actually need to participate to make it happen. Romney’s poll numbers are neck and neck with Obama’s, and the Republican party has raised and will continue to raise more money than Obama will or can. The only chance Obama has to win is if we can harness the same populist enthusiasm we did when we made history in 2008.

90 Days, 90 Reasons (Thanks, Jordan Kurland!)

David Pescovitz is Boing Boing's co-editor/managing partner. He's also a research director at Institute for the Future. On Instagram, he's @pesco.

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http://theladyfingers.blogspot.com/ Ladyfingers

There’s only one reason, really, and that’s because Mitt Romney is a disgrace to the species.
- EH
  
  Yeah, well, we probably deserve him anyway.
- http://2012diaries.blogspot.com/ tristan eldritch
  
  Yeah, my Reason would be “Because I fear being in exactly this position, a year or two into a Romney presidency:
  
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gb4eZ7Z5yk8&feature=related
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    President Obama has done some good things and some bad things and some things in between. The previous administration did only bad things. And if Romney wins, the next administration will do only bad things.
    
    The only people who seriously argue against voting for Obama are those who will be unaffected by anti-abortion laws, anti-gay laws, racist laws, etc.
    
    And to those screaming that we should throw out both parties, you might as well hold a seance and try to get Aragorn to come rule us.
    - Tribune
      
      OK who is going to buy the candles?
      - Antinous / Moderator
        
        OK who is going to buy the candles?
        
        I think that we’d have to use Fëanorian lamps, and you know how hard it is to find those these days.
      - niktemadur
        
        @Antinous_Moderator:disqus Fëanorian lamps, and you know how hard it is to find those these days.
        
        In this The Age Of Men, at a garage sale in Istanbul if you’re lucky, they’re about as scarce as Honus Wagner baseball cards in Illinois, and the sellers have to be completely clueless as to what they’ve got in their hands.
      - Antinous / Moderator
        
        I dread the day when a Silmaril shows up on eBay and it starts WWIII.
    - Adam S.
      
      Wrong. Continuing to go along every single rightward shift in the Democratic Party has done nothing but put a Reagan Conservative in the White House as a Democrat.
      
      Stop being sheep. Think for yourself. Look at what these war criminals are doing to America and America’s reputation in the world.
      - Antinous / Moderator
        
        Stop being sheep.
        
        Oh, lord. One of those commenters.
      - mage_cat
        
        This. People need to start thinking outside of the two-party box. I know third-party candidates like the Libertarian party’s Gary Johnson don’t get much press coverage, but doesn’t this blog talk all the time about people exchanging knowledge outside of mainstream channels? And making big impacts that way?
      - http://twitter.com/GideonTJones Gideon Jones
        
        The rightward shift in all of America is due to mass non-participation by people like yourself starting in the 1960′s.
        
        When roughly 1/5 of the American left stamps their feet and goes home, taking themselves out of the electoral process, it leaves the left unable to elect people who govern from the left.
    - http://theladyfingers.blogspot.com/ Ladyfingers
      
      You must admit it’s depressingly fatalist.
    - aikimoe
      
      I loathe the Bush administration but it’s not true that it “did only bad things.”
      
      http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13300363/ns/us_news-environment/t/bush-creates-worlds-biggest-ocean-preserve/
      
      (Though I can’t think of anything else good it did.)
      
      Suggesting that there are no women or gay people or black people who “seriously argue against voting for Obama” is not only objectively untrue, but kind of insulting, too.
    - Erin Conrad
      
      I don’t think we should throw out any parties. I do think having stronger ‘third’ parties, who might take away some votes for major party candidates who don’t address, or disagreeably address or totally ignore issues the voters might think is important will at least get more ideas into the wider public consciousness. I cannot in good conscience vote for either of the major party candidates. Roseanne Barr?…?? Not enough info, hated her show/attitude in it, would absolutely love to see her debate with Mitt and Obama. I may have to follow R.A.W.’s advice and write myself in… But what if I won…
    - BombBlastLightingWaltz
      
      Bush jr. introduced the new Day Light Savings moving it forward 3 weeks in the spring and later by 3 weeks in the fall all to save energy consumption. Not bad.
    - http://twitter.com/chrisjimson chris jimson
      
      I hope you don’t mind if I steal that quote. I think that sums it up pretty well.
Buelah Man

Some fools never learn.
- ZikZak
  
  Voting is the least effective strategy for having a say in society. You can vote once or twice a year, but it’s what you do every day that counts. Don’t abdicate your powers to so-called representatives – take responsibility for the ways you can change the world yourself.
  - Don’t Just Vote: Get Active!
Petzl

Instead of releasing the reasons one at a time, they should release them all now. We need the positive momentum now, 90 days ahead of the election. Energizing someone at the time of the election means Obama gets exactly one vote. Energizing someone 90 days ahead of the election means Obama gets someone who might work for his campaign, which is a huge force multiplier.
- http://www.ikaink.net Itsumishi
  
  Yes, or the 90 reasons site will be forgotten completely in a week or so. Doing it this was provides a reason for people to keep coming back to the site. It also gives bloggers, twitterers, etc bits and pieces to quote and link to at different times. It’s far more likely to get more coverage, spread over a longer period of time, to a wider audience in its current setup than the idea you’re suggesting.
  
  Besides, I imagine they haven’t found all 90 people they’ll use yet, and they’ll each need time to write their essays, etc.
  - http://twitter.com/Theranthrope Theranthrope
    
    All that is necessary for Obama to win, at this point, is for Romney to just keep talking…
thaum

Who’s behind the site? whois mentions the domain’s been acquired by proxy. That’s kinda suspicious, isn’t it?

Electoral spam masquerading as grassroots action. Not that I’d expect anything else, really.
- EH
  
  The transparency fish rots from the head down.
  - bkad
    
    I don’t know. It’s good to suspicious (though ‘astroturfing’ is my favorite political slang). On the other hand, wouldn’t you anonymize yourself if hosting a remotely political website? I mean we’re posting with pseudonyms here.
    - abacinator
      
      I’m pretty sure Dave Eggers is behind the project
    - thaum
      
      The difference is that we’re not running political advertising/astroturfing attempts.
      
      (Well, I’m certainly not.)
      - http://twitter.com/Theranthrope Theranthrope
        
        Someone attempting political advertising/astroturfing WOULD say that… How do we know FOR SURE.
- Geoduck
  
  “Domains by Proxy” is the privacy service used by GoDaddy when supplying domain hosting. It’s so you don’t broadcast your street-address all across the Internet. Of course, the fact these people are using GoDaddy is rather depressing; GD runs super-sleazy ads and came out in favor of SOPA.
- Warren_Terra
  
  Dude, the essays are signed, and the people who organized the effort are named at the site (Eggers and Kurland, if you can’t be bothered to look). The authors and the people contacting them are expressing their opinions, and attaching their names to their opinions. I suppose you could concoct some dark conspiracy here, but really: how much does it cost to design and host a website like that? And assuming the authors aren’t getting paid, that’s the total cost, unless Eggers or Kurland decided to raise some money and pay themselves for their effort as editors. But, sure, go ahead, impute shady dealings.
  - http://twitter.com/Theranthrope Theranthrope
    
    …but concocting dark conspiracies IS FUN! It’s actually a cognitive mis-feature in human pattern-recognition, like seeing seeing random shapes in clouds, or religious icons in everyday objects, or any form of fortune-telling that isn’t some form of cold-reading.
Mandy

The link’s missing an ‘m’ at the end (should be
90days90reasons.com, not
90days90reasons.co).
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  Fixed.
insert

91. Obama doesn’t have a distastefully fake Southern accent and dyslexia, so it’s totally cool that he’s killing children in Yemen and bombing funerals in Pakistan.
- http://twitter.com/trempls tré
  
  And raiding medical cannabis after promising to leave it alone, and deporting more immigrants than Bush did in his eight years, and signing the NDAA, and surging in Afghanistan, and saying he believes in gay marriage without really fighting for it, and running a kill list, and running Gitmo, and backing down on the public option, and bailing out banks… Come to think of it, there’s got to be at least 90 reasons liberal-minded people need to ask for a new Democratic candidate or mount a huge campaign for Jill Stein.
  - davigoli
    
    When someone like Obama is the GOP alternative, you’re more than welcome to campaign against him. Until then, we gotta move the ball.
    - http://twitter.com/trempls tré
      
      Where the hell are we moving this ball? I don’t want any ball that I have any part of going there.
    - Adam S.
      
      You’re got that one precisely bass ackwards.
      
      Casting your vote for conservative Democrats moves the whole country further to the right, every time you do it.
      - JProffitt71
        
        What exactly is a viable alternative here? I am all for changing the system but we’re bound by social momentum here. Solutions, please!
      - Petzl
        
        Yeah, because McCain would have totally nominated 2 liberals to the SCOTUS like Obama did. And Gore would totally have invaded Iraq and passed 2 rounds of rich-benefitting tax cuts.
Adam S.

Where’s the outrage over Obama ordering American citizens executed without a trial?

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2012/03/15/2067610/wheres-outrage-over-obamas-order.html

Where’s the outrage over Obama signing Indefinite Detention of American citizens into law?

http://www.aclu.org/blog/national-security/president-obama-signs-indefinite-detention-law
- EH
  
  Someone must have shaken the Etch-A-Sketch.
- elchip
  
  Where’s the outrage over re-signing the Patriot Act?
- filebunch
  
  I hate to say it, but the current president is good at nothing. The republican has business sense. Right now we have to go that way.
  
  President Obama was nice in theory, terrible in execution.
  - Pope Ratzo
    
    ”Business sense” 2012-style is not a good thing.
    
    At all.
  - mage_cat
    
    You know there are options other than the two major parties right? Gary Johnson, the Libertarian candidate, has a great platform that I think would win if more people knew about it.
    - http://twitter.com/Theranthrope Theranthrope
      
      Which would be fine except for the whole “Libertarian”-thing, with their: “the ‘invisible hand of the market’ will fix everything! …and bring me a pony for Christmas!”-thinking…
    - IronEdithKidd
      
      Great. Vote for a conservative republican masquerading as a Rand-oid.
      
      Not even once.
      
      Edit: since I can no longer reply to mage_cat, I add the following:
      I have looked into his politics. He’s a republican who’s perhaps a bit less conservative than Romney. This present foray into libertarianism is extremely recent, or have you forgotten that he already tried to run, this year, as a republican? Not that it’s any of your business, but if I were to piss away my vote on a third party, it would be for Green.
      
      I genuinely hope that “pro-guy rights” is a typo.
      - mage_cat
        
        Have you looked into his politics at all? The man is pro-choice, pro-gay rights (typo corrected), and backed several other very good policies, like the FairTax Act. You should research before dismissing him.
        
        Edit in response to edit: I’m more inclined to say he’s a bit less conservative than Ron Paul, and if I’m following you correctly, you consider voting for a third party to be wasting your vote (common enough even if I disagree with it) but hold it against the man when he tries to run with the major party that is slightly closer to his views so he can get votes from people who think voting for third parties is wasting their votes. He may have turned down the Libertarian presidential nomination of 2000 saying he was a Republican, but the fact that he was offered it in the first place shows his views were already pretty Libertarian back then. If he’s now willing to run as a Libertarian candidate, I can believe that 12 years is enough time for him to honestly change his mind about how strongly he identifies as a Republican.
  - jhoosier
    
    If “business sense” means tearing companies apart and shipping their jobs overseas, I’ll have no part of that.
- Iphinome Iphinome
  
  It takes a back seat to the outrage I’d feel if Romney replaces Ruth Ginsberg and Roe v Wade is overturned.
  
  How about not trying to suppress democrat votes. tell us how Romney won’t be worse than anything Obama can do?
WhiteOwl1972

“We’re actors! If we didn’t exist, how would people know who to vote for?”
– Jenna Maroney
http://twitter.com/zeroanaphora แอ็ะปปี้

I don’t really get the point in this. Who’s it supposed to convince? Is anyone really on the fence?

There is only one reason to vote for Obama, and it’s a good one: Romney is worse.

Hold your nose, vote Obama. Vote your ideals locally, you will never find them represented nationally (unless you are rich). Find other ways to get your voice heard.
http://twitter.com/zeroanaphora แอ็ะปปี้

Shhhh, now’s not the time, there’s an election to win! If we lose, can you imagine Mitt Romney with the executive power to kill anyone he wants with a flying robot? I sure don’t want to see that!
- Adam S.
  
  Wrong. It’s time to be a responsible adult about one’s voting responsibilties and cast a vote for candidate who is not so likely to commit more war crimes.
  - Sagodjur
    
    Only a rebellious teenager would throw a vote away in symbolic protest. Responsible adults make the hard decisions, such as re-electing a man who handed the DOJ over to the entertainment industry and signed the NDAA, because his opponent would have hesitated to sign the NDAA less and would hand the DOJ over some other set of corporations that do more than ineptly try to shut down the internet and return us to the 20th century.
    - Adam S.
      
      Wrong. The facts are that it’s easier to change rules in Congress to a multi-party system then it is to pass a law. Changing House and Senate rules only requires a majority vote at the beginning of a new session of Congress.
      
      See the NDP in Canada and the Lib Dems in the UK.
      http://www.ndp.ca/
      http://www.libdems.org.uk/home.aspx
      
      The Amercia left could have a real voice in Governance within months if we chose to. Anyone who says different is lying to you.
      - http://twitter.com/shay_guy Shay Guy
        
        And how do you propose “we” get that majority vote?
      - Adam S.
        
        Shay Guy
        “And how do you propose “we” get that majority vote?”
        
        The same way multi-party governments form coalition governments every where else on the planet.
      - Antinous / Moderator
        
        The same way multi-party governments form coalition governments every where else on the planet.
        
        I’m unclear how you would apply that to a political system which is not parliamentary. In fact, the founding fathers seem to have deliberately chosen a non-parliamentary system. Can what you suggest exist within the limits of the Constitution?
      - emacsomancer
        
        @Antinous_Moderator:disqus
        
        I’m unclear how you would apply that to a political system which is not parliamentary. In fact, the founding fathers seem to have deliberately chosen a non-parliamentary system. Can what you suggest exist within the limits of the Constitution?
        
        Presumably this is indeed incoherent in relation to a Presidential election (sadly).
        
        I don’t see anything which rules out coalition-style governing in the House and Senate however (in principle, though obviously it doesn’t really happen in reality unless you count “Democrats + Bernie Sanders” as a coalition….)
      - http://twitter.com/matthjones Matt Jones
        
        The Lib Dems do what the Tories tell them to do.
    - http://twitter.com/trempls tré
      
      “Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost.” – John Quincy Adams, rebellious teenager.
      
      I can’t reply to Antinous anymore, but excellent point and the comment has been edited to reflect reality.
      - Pope Ratzo
        
        John Quincy Adams? He was the useless Adams, if memory serves.
      - Antinous / Moderator
        
        Well, given that he turned 9 in 1776, I think that we can at least rule out describing him as a founding father. He did quite a few good things in his political career, though.
  - http://whimsicalacious.tumblr.com/ Patrick McGorrill
    
    Wrong. It’s time to be an irresponsible child under one’s voting rights and cast a vote for a candidate who is more unlikely to commit more crimes.
    
    The chaos of parties dribbles over politics, but reminds career politicians to shuffle our spirits through fungal mazes. Native reiteration does only arise about exuding some stricture which might arrest socio-cultural patterns. A serial becomes a cereal of purposiveness or will be stomped over tree trunks.
Roman Berry

Reasons? No. Spin.

Please make the brain-dead partisanship stop. Just because Romney would likely be bad does not mean that Obama is good. Both are awful and the best America could do is to kick ALL the bums from b0th wings of The Money Party out and start again.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  Please do feel free to tell us exactly how you’re going to kick out the two major parties.
  - http://theladyfingers.blogspot.com/ Ladyfingers
    
    I dunno, it’s one thing to be really anti the opposition for perfectly good reasons and vote for the lesser of two evils, and it’s another thing to be willfully blind to your own side’s failings even if they’re exactly what you criticise the opposition for.
    - Antinous / Moderator
      
      We here at Boing Boing rip President Obama quite a few new assholes every week. I hardly think that there’s much willful blindness going on here. For all Obama’s faults, if Romney is elected, we move closer to a society in which only straight, white, Christian men have any say.
      - Adam S.
        
        Obama has more than gone out of his way to not just continue previous war crime, he’s committed new warcrimes all his own. Obama has earned every last bit of the asshole ripping he’s gotten.
        
        http://www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/countries/americas/usa
        
        Look at all the Human Rights abuses the US is responsible for here and around the world!
      - http://theladyfingers.blogspot.com/ Ladyfingers
        
        Oh look, I think Boing Boing is much better than most non-Right Wing blogs/sites when it comes to fawning over Obama, but posting this link made me think of Stockholm Syndrome or something.
        
        Sure, Romney is a repulsive, bigoted slimeball who should probably be incarcerated for his business practices, but Obama is an unbearably smarmy cryptofascist and I feel a mild despair whenever I see him referred to in less than pejorative terms.
      - sic transit gloria C.F.A.
        
        Straight, white, rich Christian men. FTFY.
  - Adam S.
    
    There’s no reason Americans can’t do the exact same thing the NDP in Canada did and the Liberal Democrats did in the UK. The NDP has only been around since 1961. The Liberal Democrats in the UK didn’t form until 1988.
    
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Democratic_Party
    
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Democrats
    - Antinous / Moderator
      
      They’re parliamentary systems. It’s an entire different form of government. There’s no elected leader. Why are you presenting two countries without elected leaders as examples in a discussion about the Presidency? Once again, unless you’re suggesting burning the Constitution (which is fine with me), those examples are irrelevant.
      - http://twitter.com/GideonTJones Gideon Jones
        
        Lotta folks confusing their ideological opinions and knowledge, with political opinions and knowledge.
    - jrevelator
      
      I’m a Canadian, and an NDP supporter. However the NDP has been the third choice for the last sixty years here, and although they are presently the official opposition, it may very well be an anomaly. Point being, a “true” left leaning socialist party is an extremely tough sell in any capitalist system, and it certainly ain’t gonna happen in the U.S. by November, so who do you propose people vote for in the mean time?
      - Adam S.
        
        I’ve been involved in the Occupy movement. I support them. I’m not a fan of their concensus process, though.
        
        I’m voting for Rocky Anderson
        
        http://www.voterocky.org/
      - Bobsyeruncle
        
        Well, seeing as how the Liberals got destroyed in the last election, I can’t really see the NDP not being viable in the next election as well.
  - http://twitter.com/Black_Robert Robert Austin
    
    For some time now the Republicans have looked like a coalition of mutually antagonistic, sub parties: the hawks, the religious right, the teaps and the Big Business Super Fan Club. If they get hammered in this election, I wouldn’t be surprised if it started to split up. The teaps would likely leave first, because they’d be so angry that a spineless moderate was nominated and lost them the election. And if Democrats didn’t fear losing power to the Republicans (since they wouldn’t be able to pull ~50% anymore), a lot more people would be willing to leave the party to join the Greens or something.
    
    Far more likely that the major parties will self destruct than that they will be kicked out.
Gerald Mander

Seriously, WTF is this doing here? By almost any standard I’m a liberal, and this still smacks of annoying sanctimony.
- Slowermo
  
  Sanctimony: pretending to have qualities or beliefs that you do not really have.
  
  Nope. That doesn’t describe these essays. And these people have correctly given up on waiting for mini-me’s. No one is going to match you exactly and you shouldn’t expect them to.
http://twitter.com/strugglngwriter strugglngwriter

It’s a shame Obama had to be drug, kicking and screaming, to “evolve” to support gay marriage.

It’s a bigger shame that I will vote for him as the lesser evil. Learned that lesson as a Pennsylvania voter stuck with the greater evil, a tea-bagger Governor.
- Adam S.
  
  Voting for lesser evil won’t stop the Tea Baggers. What stopped the Tea Party in Wisconsin? Marching on the State Capitol in Madison stopped the Tea Party dead in it’s tracks.
  
  Direct Nonviolent Action is the solution to the Tea Party.
  - http://twitter.com/strugglngwriter strugglngwriter
    
    The problem is I worry Meh Romney, or whomever calls the shots for him, will be even worse on human rights, war, etc. than Obama will be.
Adam S.

You can not hold your nose and vote for a war criminal. That’s aiding and abetting war crimes. You obviously vote for someone who is not a war criminal.
- oasisob1
  
  Yet. Give someone the presidency in our current environment, they’ll become one. I mean, if you call the current president a war criminal, then you must think the last one was, and that the next one will be.
  - Adam S.
    
    Yes, Poppy Bush, Clinton, GW Bush, Obama all war criminals.
    
    Yes, unrestricted bombing campaigns on civilians is a quick path to a war crimes trial. Obama put exclamation point on his when he ordered another round of drone strike’s to kill Anwar al-Awlaki teenage children who had survive the previous attack.
  - http://twitter.com/trempls tré
    
    Last one yes, next one possibly. But “everyone’s doing it” actually isn’t that good of a defense against war crimes; people have tried.
    - oasisob1
      
      Oh I’m not defending it at all.
- Petzl
  
  I guess you voted for Nader, because “both parties are the same.” Bush sure did everything Gore would’ve done.
mesocosm

Obama 2012: Because the Other Guy Will Do An Even More Thorough Job of Looting the Treasury!
http://twitter.com/postvacuous Spencer Janyk

I hope we get more cruise missile strikes, drone strikes, torture of Muslim teenagers and pandering to the GOP the second time around.
- Cowicide
  
  http://i.imgur.com/6jHDX.jpg
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_LFOAX7CLUYF56EA2KNCR3C24KE Noah

When is the essay on how sweet the drug war scheduled to appear? ‘Cuz the drug war is frakkin’ sweet!
Tchoutoye

Barrack O’ Bomber vs. Plute Romney
The puppet master’s left hand vs. the puppet master’s right hand
Tweedledee vs. Tweedledumb
Nero vs. Caligula
the 1% vs. the loyal servant of the 1%

Occupy the elections. Vote both bum parties out.
- Navin_Johnson
  
  The puppet master’s left hand vs. the puppet master’s right hand
  
  The puppet master’s right hand vs. the puppet master’s extreme right hand.
- http://twitter.com/trempls tré
  
  Goldman Sachs donation recipient vs Goldman Sachs donation recipient
http://www.facebook.com/people/Ryan-Mcarthur/567114771 Ryan Mcarthur

Because Obama has closed Gitomo
Because Obama has stopped the War on Terror.
Because Obama has closed the TSA.
Because Obama closed MegaUpload.
Because Obama isn’t the other guy.
Because its better the devil you know than the one that you don’t.
Because Hope and Change.
- Cowicide
  
  Because Romney is the realistic alternative.
- Pope Ratzo
  
  Because Obama nominated two Supreme Court justices who will not vote with the far-right maniacs.
  
  That’s all that matters to me. We’re going exactly nowhere, not on the surveillance state, not on the phony war on drugs, not on anything, until Citizens United is overturned, buried and trees planted over the grave.
  
  I’d vote for an honest man like my friend Bill Ayers in a second if he was running, but until then, I have to try to protect my family. I’m voting against the Republican, pure and simple. I will contribute to make sure the Republican is defeated. If I have to, I’ll go out and work to see the Republican defeated.
  
  (to be perfectly honest, I vote the way my wife votes. She has a much better sense of these things than I do, and her protective instincts in regard to our daughter has never failed once. And she says the zombie-eyed granny starver who’s now the VP candidate from the Right is all the proof we need of where they want to take the country).
- Petzl
  
  Because I can’t get everything I want, I’m going to vote for something that’s worse. 2000 and 2004 were good years for that.
  - occupyordie
    
    not sure if you remember or not, but the president who sat from 04-08 wasnt really elected that time around, in fact the first time was suspect as well. Those elections taught me exactly what my vote is worth.
Snig

For those needing a starker comparison, please come up with 90 reasons you were happy Bush was president.
- Erin Conrad
  
  ugh, ick, which one, I probably can… First and foremost: they were ‘republicans’ and more of the American ‘left’ paid attention to what they were up to. No, nvm, I can’t come up with anything like 90 reasons to support the Bush presidencies, I’d love to say, “Due election under fair democratic policies.” But… Thank Chronos for Citizens United, that should clear up any questions about who actually runs/owns our election apparatus.
Navin_Johnson

Obamacrats make no demands or conditions for their votes and just dutifully cast their ballots and grumble “Anybody but Romney”, while on the other hand, the plutocrats DO make demands and expect returns for the help they give to politicians, and they follow up to make sure they get them.
ahecht

The biggest issue is the Supreme Court. I believe that no matter whether you are a democrat or a republican, having balance on the court is crucial to our “Checks and Balances” system maintaining integrity. The Robert court is one of the most conservative courts in a long time, and if Breyer and Ginsburg retire and are replaced with conservatives under a Romney presidency, then the results would be disastrous.
- Adam S.
  
  Sorry… but Obama judical appointments ARE likely more conservative than McCain would have been and little different than Romney. They’ve been more conservative than Poppy Bush
  - Petzl
    
    False. Ridiculously and demonstrably so. And as for McCain, he’d've had to follow the Geo (41) Bush route and nominate severe conservatives. Like Clarence Thomas.
    
    Imagine what the SCOTUS would be right now with McCain. Instead of a 4-4-1 court (Im calling Kennedy the “1″, although hes really GOP), it would be 6-2-1. 6 die-hard conservatives. Roe is overturned in an instant. Even if Roberts has a change of heart, like he did with Obamacare, and buys into his own bullshit regarding stare decisis and being an umpire calling strikes and balls, he couldn’t stop it.
mesocosm

I can’t see voting for a president who claims that a secret internal executive branch review of secret evidence meets the constitutional standard of due process when it comes to executing American citizens and their sixteen-year-old American citizen childrens. The guy who voted for retroactive immunity for telecoms before he was even senator. And NDAA authorization of indefinite detentions? Who wanted that?

Yeah, we’re less popular in the Middle East now than under GW, so get your war on.

Death from above, Muslim world! We’ll fund Tunisia and Egypt till the eleventh hour and then claim we supported grassroots democracy all along! Then we’ll bomb Libya in a friendly bombing campaign that doesn’t require Congressional approval because bombing people isn’t “hostilities!” We’re just playin’!

Oh yeah, and who’s the Chief of Staff in the White House right now? Not the guy who ran the collateralized debt obligations branch of Citigroup in 2008!?

Get your election on, punks. I’m voting for Ralph Nader.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  Get your election on, punks. I’m voting for Ralph Nader.
  
  Because that worked so well in 2000.
Be_Reasonable

I’d actually like to see a Romney list.

Although if I see “he’s a good businessman” on the list, I’ll know right away that the list isn’t serious.

Government isn’t a business. It can’t be run like one and shouldn’t be. Businesses exist to make money. Full stop.

Governments exist to serve their people.

The two goals are often incompatible. If you tell me that you’re a good businessperson and that is what makes you qualified to run the government, well, I know that given the choice, you’ll choose not to serve me, but to make a profit instead, because you believe that is the right thing to do.

I don’t fault a businessperson for thinking this way, it’s the way to succeed in business, but why in the hell would I want someone like that running my government?
Mister44

The reality is: there isn’t going to be a big difference in policy changes no matter who gets into office.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  The reality is: there isn’t going to be a bid difference in policy changes no matter who gets into office.
  
  That is a lie. Look at the Bush administration and tell me how much of what happened militarily or economically would have been the same if Gore had been in office for those eight years.
  - zippy_monster
    
    Yeah, except Gore wasn’t in office. Bush was. Then Obama, who simply took Bush’s policies and enacted a more extreme implementation of them. We’re not looking at the possibility of (re)electing Gore. We’re looking at Obama. And Romney. And Bush.
    
    If the best you can do is toe the partisan line, that’s pretty fucking sad. At least Romney supported gay marriage.
    - Antinous / Moderator
      
      At least Romney supported gay marriage.
      
      In what parallel universe?
    - sic transit gloria C.F.A.
      
      At least Romney supported gay marriage.
      
      Romney has never supported gay marriage.
    - Snig
      
      Romney signed the NOM pledge, which is basically Homophobia Incorporated.
  - Griffon
    
    Hell, if all those clueless Gore voters had voted for Nader, we would have gotten some real, authentic reform rather than more DNC sellouts.
    
    Gore ran a craptacular campaign and was more of the same. The tired canard that Nader voters “elected” bush simply because the Nader voters wanted authentic change, real reform and a viable peace rather than a DNC/corporate stooge only points to the intellectual cowardice and laziness of the ‘mainstream’ party voters.
    
    Remember, the two parties got us to this point, and it is a toilet, teetering on the edge of a cesspool.
    
    All due to the two-party republican/democratic system. Both owned outright by Wall St.
    - penguinchris
      
      I think Antinous would agree with me that everyone railing on the two-party system, and those who perpetuate it, are correct in at least the point about the two-party system being a disaster for the country.
      
      The problem is that today, realistically, we can not change that.
      
      We can rant about it, sure. We can not go into the election booth in November and make even a tiny bit of difference. We can’t send a message to government that third parties matter. There are simply not enough people who will care enough to “throw away” their vote, and for good reason – it could lead to Romney winning.
      
      We need election reform. Total overhaul. Use runoff voting, or whatever is determined to give third parties the best chance while not throwing away anybody’s vote. Whatever – smarter people than I can figure out how it should be reformed.
      
      Once that happens, perhaps the two parties will split up and people will form new parties that actually stand for something. We can get the coalition governments that @Adam503:disqus keeps going on about.
      
      But it will require major action from government to do this. We can not only not vote it into existence ourselves, we can not even let them know that we would like this because they won’t listen – and it goes against their entrenched interests anyway.
      
      And no grassroots movement is going to gather enough momentum to get enough third-party votes in to make a difference – our stupid society will resist.
      
      It’s pretty hopeless which is why these discussions often end in the suggestion of revolution. I don’t think that will be necessary, but it will be quite a long time before anything changes, and when we’re faced right now with the fact that doing the right thing and voting for a third party – to show your support for third parties, not to realistically expect them to win – means increasing the likelihood an asshole like Romney gets elected president, we’re fucked. And yes – I’m sure they (“they”) know that. They want to perpetuate the current system.
      - Adam S.
        
        Rubbish.
        
        House and Senate rules are the only place there is a two party system delineated
        
        It’s not in the Constitition. It’s not even Federal Law. It’s House and Senate rules. That’s it. Just like the Filabuster. The US can change to a multi-party system just as easily as the last change to the Filibuster. Majority vote at the beginning of the term of Congress just like any other House Senate rules change.
      - Antinous / Moderator
        
        For the last time, what does that have to do with the Presidency?
      - bzishi
        
        @Adam503:disqus The US Constitution does not support proportional representation (PR). Without PR, third parties don’t stand a chance. A third party could get 30% of the vote in every election in the country and still not have a single seat in Congress. Most of the coalition governments in the world exist because of PR. The US system of First-past-the-post (FPTP) stabilizes with 2 parties. While there are FPTP systems that have coalitions, it would be hard to get the momentum in the US.
        
        In my opinion, the only way we can break this two party deadlock is with a re-design of the elections from the House and Senate. Perhaps change the election method of members in the Senate to instant runoff voting and then have the House become a national at-large district with PR. This would also take care of gerrymandering at the national level.
      - Griffon
        
        “The problem is that today, realistically, we can not change that. “
        
        I believe you mistake inability with discomfort.
        
        It will absolutely not be easy, but the realistic fact is that even as recently as 1992, Perot nearly upset the two-party duopoly.
        
        It will be difficult, but the alternative; the continued slide and theft of our republic, our treasury and our civil rights, is a deal breaker.
        
        There are templates, examples and information out there to consider:
        
        How Swedes and Norwegians Broke the Power of the ‘1 Percent’
        
        While many of us are working to ensure that the Occupy movement will have a lasting impact, it’s worthwhile to consider other countries where masses of people succeeded in nonviolently bringing about a high degree of democracy and economic justice. Sweden and Norway, for example, both experienced a major power shift in the 1930s after prolonged nonviolent struggle. They “fired” the top 1 percent of people who set the direction for society and created the basis for something different.
        
        “There are simply not enough people who will care enough to “throw away” their vote, and for good reason – it could lead to Romney winning.”
        
        Truth be told, the bogie man that is trotted out every few years to sucker voters into keeping an unhinged, creepingly-further-right, malleable and venal whore in office does not achieve the desired effect in me. It will get worse, be it obama or Romney; I’m not going to pretend the election has any basis in reality due to prearranged, corporate-approved choices.
        
        Obama was ‘elected’ on the absolute repudiation of republican policy; he then embraced and expanded those policies while knifing his supporters in the back and slamming them at wealthy cocktail fundraisers.
        
        “We need election reform. Total overhaul.”
        
        Absolutely, along with transparency, oversight, a paper trail, an end to lobbyists, corporate money out of politics and the ‘Citizens United’ struck down, to name a few.
        
        “Once that happens, perhaps the two parties will split up and people will form new parties that actually stand for something.”
        
        I’m standing for something now.
        
        As Vandana Shiva related on Moyers & Company, “You do not measure the fruit of your action, you’ve to measure your obligation for action.” Winning is secondary to the rightness of the action necessary.
        
        Rarely are revolutions successful on the first day, however, I cannot and will not behave as if the government ‘leadership’ is in the interest of democracy or the will of its People. Within my capacity, I will become a friction in the machine.
        
        “But it will require major action from government to do this.”
        
        A government cannot run but for the cooperation of its people. I’m done cooperating with this farce.
        
        “It’s pretty hopeless which is why these discussions often end in the suggestion of revolution. I don’t think that will be necessary, but it will be quite a long time before anything changes, and when we’re faced right now with the fact that doing the right thing and voting for a third party – to show your support for third parties, not to realistically expect them to win – means increasing the likelihood an asshole like Romney gets elected president, we’re fucked.”
        
        We are f*cked anyway; obama and the doormat democrats’ tranquilizing drug of gradualism, NDAA, war expansion, torture and fealty to Wall St. only slightly delays the inevitable. Worst case scenario: Romney wins and the stepped-up insanity of it finally, finally motivates people to decry and rebel as they should be now.
        
        We are being conditioned to accept the obscenely unacceptable.
        
        Make no mistake; obama is a nightmare and a disgrace. To have this country arrive at the horrific choice of a corporate-owned, extraConstitutional assassin, or just a corporate-owned, bumbling assclown tells me that the system is beyond broken and we are paying through the nose for absolutely no voice and no accountability.
        
        I object.
        
        It’s time to break out the monkey wrenches.
      - sic transit gloria C.F.A.
        
        Adam S:
        
        House and Senate rules are the only place there is a two party system delineated
        
        It doesn’t have to be explicitly written into the law. The two-party system arises naturally from the structure of the electoral system due to the spoiler effect. There’s no PR, no IRV or Condorcet. Winner takes all. Remember Nader in 2000?
    - Petzl
      
      Jesus Christ. A Nader voter who has the benefit of hindsight and still thinks a Nader vote was not a disaster.
      
      Well, at least he didn’t use the word “sheeple” like the Tea Partiers, who also think they’re enlightened.
  - Mister44
    
    Who is to say what Gore would have done. EVERYONE was calling for blood after 9/11. Though I conceded that Gore probably wouldn’t have gone into iraq – at least so ill prepared.
    
    Obama hasn’t done much different militarily. Troops are pulling out, but IIRC they were slated to do that before he took office. He has no problem using drone strikes, and gitmo is still in operation (something I really thought he would have shut down by now).
    - Petzl
      
      I need to have the drugs you must be on to contort my reasoning to see Gore behaving in any way similar to Geo W Bush.
      
      There’s no possibility Gore would’ve invaded Iraq: no connection to Al-Qaeda, no bin Laden, no WMDs. Only a complete fool with a cynical VP puppetmaster wouldve invaded Iraq for 9/11.
      - TrollyMcTrollington
        
        If the theoretical Gore presidency had been anything like Lieberman’s real track record since 2000, it would have been closer to W’s than you think.
    - Maria Moliner
      
      Under Gore there would have been no Condoliza Rice and no 9/11.
- Geoduck
  
  Anyone who thinks that is probably a white straight guy. Romney gets elected, things are going to get much worse for everybody else.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_CDBCSJ67QEF6I5EBWZLVPZB5K4 william shannon

http://www.jillstein.org/

The Lesser Of The Two Evils Is Still Seriously F’n Evil

GMO’s, Privacy, Drones, Fracking, 420, Guantanamo, Wall Street Bailout, Refusal to Prosecute Bush Cheney Rumsfeld Crimes against Humanity
- sic transit gloria C.F.A.
  
  All true. So by all means vote symbolically for a third-party candidate, which will only help the candidate who would do worse. It won’t help the country but at least you’ll feel clean. See my long post below for more details.
Snig

Romney thanks all left of center types for your third party votes. Here’s some of the policies you can help bring into place:
His surrogate, Pawlenty, doesn’t feel they’ve gone far enough with drone attacks. Romney has suggested the doubling of Guantanamo Bay prison camp. We apparently need to invest more in oil and coal. He doesn’t believe a declaration of war is neccesary for him to begin an invasion of Iran. He opposed withdrawl from Iraq.
Aurvondel

Obama has prosecuted more whistle-blowers under the draconian Espionage Act, one of the most hideous bills to ever pass the the US congress, than all other presidents combined.

Obama has signed a bill to allow indefinite detention of terrorism suspects, enshrining a Bush-era policy in our legal system. He promises not to use it against Americans, but what about everyone else? Are non-Americans so despicable that it’s legal to incarcerate them for the rest of their lives on secret, non-reviewable evidence?

Obama has carried out assassinations against American citizens, including assassinations of juveniles, absent any due process procedure, or any non-executive oversight at all. He has redefined “militants” to mean any adult male outside the US as a “military combatant”.

Obama promised on one hand that he would not interfere with state’s rights when it comes to medical marijuana, and many rubes still believe this, though his prosecutions and DoJ property forfeiture in medical marijuana cases have far outstripped the Bush administration.

Obama has accelerated the deportation of economic immigrants beyond the previous Republican administration, without regard to whether they were “felons” or not. Families are being torn apart, despite his cynical mouthing of support for a “DREAM” act, or his promise to not deport people who voluntarily come forth and register with the INS, without any official legal guarantee that the INS won’t turn around and deport them.

I will not be voting for Obama this election, under any circumstances. I certainly won’t be voting for Romney either, but if Romney were as “incompetent” as Bush was, it would be a net gain for the nation in terms of civil liberties. The best to hope for is that the 2016 election will present us with something more palatable.
Griffon

The system, as it stands, is corporately controlled and will not afford a true democracy. It is not sustainable as a mechanism to fairly serve the American public, but only moneyed interests.

A major defense of the president exaggerates Obama’s accomplishments and misses the point: his scandalous transgressions against rule of law.
…
How would you have reacted in 2008 if any Republican ran promising to do the following?

(1) Codify indefinite detention into law; (2) draw up a secret kill list of people, including American citizens, to assassinate without due process; (3) proceed with warrantless spying on American citizens; (4) prosecute Bush-era whistleblowers for violating state secrets; (5) reinterpret the War Powers Resolution such that entering a war of choice without a Congressional declaration is permissible; (6) enter and prosecute such a war; (7) institutionalize naked scanners and intrusive full body pat-downs in major American airports; (8) oversee a planned expansion of TSA so that its agents are already beginning to patrol American highways, train stations, and bus depots; (9) wage an undeclared drone war on numerous Muslim countries that delegates to the CIA the final call about some strikes that put civilians in jeopardy; (10) invoke the state-secrets privilege to dismiss lawsuits brought by civil-liberties organizations on dubious technicalities rather than litigating them on the merits; (11) preside over federal raids on medical marijuana dispensaries; (12) attempt to negotiate an extension of American troops in Iraq beyond 2011 (an effort that thankfully failed); (14) reauthorize the Patriot Act; (13) and select an economic team mostly made up of former and future financial executives from Wall Street firms that played major roles in the financial crisis.

There’s more, such as obama’s backroom deal with the hospital and pharma lobbies to kill the Public Option as well as bargaining power for lower drug prices, (both while baldly lying to the public about his support of the Public Option.) Then instituting a recycled 1993 republican Heritage Foundation healthcare plan first advocated by none other than Newt Gingrich and renamed the ACA.

Defending and blocking investigations into war crimes of not only his but his predecessor’s administration, Bagram torture site, no substantive investigations into Wall St. fraud, the NDAA veto threat which was really about including Americans, loading the Agriculture Department with Monsanto cronies,….etc.

The most darkly ironic argument against the republicans, obstructionism, is also the greatest indictment against the democrats; many of the most heinous policies had their genesis while democrats could well have exercised the same parliamentary obstructionism to save us from the Iraq war, Torture, secrecy, collusion, Wall St. fraud, etc., and they did nothing and continue to do nothing while crying crocodile tears and selectively feigning powerlessness.

This is where we are. There is no ‘struggle to save democracy’ against the forces of corporate/republican domination; that is already ensconced as private corporations now exclusively count the votes without oversight or public scrutiny and anoint the “frontrunners,” even going to court to block those who would voice sane and populist policy against corporate control. The Ratchet Effect is in place.

The answer is to attack the broken system, to realize that this ‘two-party’ mechanism is a fraud; a simple, controlled Morton’s Fork that depends on illusion and a sustained effort in maintaining an unaware populace. Until that realization is embraced, we will all continue to lose to a small cadre of corporations’ control until the leash, the shackle and the whip become the ‘secure’ norm.

Already we are being strip-seached as state policy. Already the outrageous is coerced into palatability. Already we are bullied into surrender. Both parties promise more.

You cannot change the game from within; for the rules, dice and spaces have long ago been set and are controlled by those who would remain Masters and Kings at all costs. The game must be razed and our voice, our power, rebooted.

(parts are from an earlier post of mine on another blog.)
- sic transit gloria C.F.A.
  
  It’s not the first time. Read up on the history of the labor movement sometime. Anything can be overturned if enough citizens get mad enough to make the necessary sacrifices.
  - Griffon
    
    “Anything can be overturned if enough citizens get mad enough to make the necessary sacrifices.”
    
    Exactly.
bzishi

I’ll vote for Obama because I think the US would kill a lot less people with him in office. I am really not looking forward to a war with Iran. With Romney it would be “damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead”. But unlike for Admiral Farragut, those torpedoes aren’t mines, they are millions of lives.

It is sad that I have to pick a President based on the number of people he would murder, but there it is.
- Cocomaan
  
  As a candidate, Obama was explicit in saying that Iran would be negotiated with *directly*. That has not happened. And shit, Obama isn’t saying anything about negotiating with Iran now, in fact his staff is publicly and constantly reassuring Israel that it is ready to engage Iran militarily.
  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444320704577564360899326198.html It's also pertinent to add that Obama has been attacking Iran with government created computer viruses – talk about escalation. Even Bush wasn’t doing that. I see no reason to think that we aren’t going to attack Iran in the near future. Obama has made ZERO positive moves on Iran.
rationalthought

If it’s between Obama and Romney you really aren’t given a choice. They are both going to push the same agenda which is not going to be in your best interest.
Why don’t you have an ‘election’ like you did in the 1770′s ?
1776 ring any bells America?
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  You’re not even in the US. Isn’t it a bit cheeky for you to tell us that we should start a violent revolution to overthrow our government?
  - 100_billion_planets
    
    That sounds like a lame excuse not to have a revolution. Concrete arguments please!
    - Antinous / Moderator
      
      I’m in. You fire the first shot and we’ll blog it.
    - sic transit gloria C.F.A.
      
      Please study the Iranian revolution, started by the left wing and taken over by hard-right fundamentalists, then explain why the same thing would not happen here. That concrete enough for you?
      - Antinous / Moderator
        
        More than took over. The Organization of Iranian People’s Fedai Guerrillas slaughtered tens of thousands of moderate leftists.
  - TheMudshark
    
    A bit maybe. But since the US is meddling in everyone´s affairs world wide, in a range from lobbying to outright invasion, everyone has a stake in your elections as well.
  - Dave Lloyd
    
    Perhaps, because you lot bang on about your “freedom” and your constitutional “right” to bear arms and use them against oppressive government. Well, on the outside we’ve seen you suffer a lot of that, but where’s the revolution?
    
    We blamed the Germans who voted in Hitler in the 1930s for meekly facilitating the Holocaust. Will we be blaming the USA for the crimes against humanity of Bush, Obama and so forth?
http://twitter.com/GideonTJones Gideon Jones

Gotta love the self-proclaimed civil libertarians in this thread that have managed to go 100+ comments without mentioning women, gay folk, Blacks, Latinos, or any of the other groups of Americans with basic freedoms on the line here.
- aikimoe
  
  Believe it or not, there actually are women, gay folk, Blacks, and Latinos who refuse to vote for anyone, Democrat or Republican, who has demonstrated the kind of blatant disregard for civil liberties that Obama has, and which Romney would continue.
  - http://twitter.com/GideonTJones Gideon Jones
    
    Sorry, but not really. The sort of self-righteous “I’m not voting because there’s no difference between the parties” bullshit on display here is almost solely the domain of straight white dudes whose privilege affords them the luxury of grandstanding about mostly hypothetical crap, while ignoring the real things at stake for hundreds of millions of Americans.
- http://theladyfingers.blogspot.com/ Ladyfingers
  
  “Basic freedoms” like the habeas corpus that Obama doesn’t care about?
  
  Yeah, I think they’d be more likely to vote for the guy who doesn’t threaten every citizen directly with indefinite detention than the guy who’s marginally less bigoted in legislation than his competitors.
  
  Sadly, there’s no option on that front.
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    “Basic freedoms” like the habeas corpus that Obama doesn’t care about
    
    Bush Jr. is the one who suspended habeas corpus.
    - http://theladyfingers.blogspot.com/ Ladyfingers
      
      Yeah, but Obama doesn’t care about it.
    - Cocomaan
      
      Obama is involved with rendition, just like Bush and just like Clinton. It’s sad to see people defending him on it.
      - http://twitter.com/GideonTJones Gideon Jones
        
        There have been multiple trials and releases since the 2008 supreme court decision reinstating habeas corpus for the detainees. Less since the circuit court changed some of the rules for the trials, but there have still been hearings and releases.
        
        And there have been about 70 detainees released during the Obama administration above and beyond those released as a result of their habeas corpus hearings. How exactly did you miss all of this?
  - http://twitter.com/GideonTJones Gideon Jones
    
    There have been zero people placed into Guantanamo without habeas corpus hearings in the last 4 years. A number of previously held detainees have had their hearings, and several have won those hearings and been released.
    
    Even if none of that was the case, I’d be more than able to balance the crappiness a hundred detainees are subjected to, against the crappiness facing a couple hundred million Americans.
    
    Would I rather have neither group subjected to this shit? Of course. But I’m not willing to let the GOP strip the rest of us of hard earned rights just because Obama hasn’t gotten some things right, or has been prevented from doing what I want.
    - Cocomaan
      
      There have been multiple American citizens assassinated without due process, without habeas corpus, without any trial whatsoever. Sorry, I’m not buying it.
      - http://twitter.com/GideonTJones Gideon Jones
        
        Read past the first line please. And if you’re not going to read past the first line, at least get the number of “assassinations” correct.
Petzl

You know, it wouldn’t be a bad investment for Republican super-PACs to be investing money in infiltrating various liberal blogging and social media sites and planting seeds of doubt vis a vis Obama. If you can’t get them to vote for Romney, make sure they waste their vote or lackadaisically cast no vote at all because “they’re all the same.”

I just hope there are liberal operatives on The Blaze and WorldNetDaily telling people to vote for Ron Paul. It’s doubtful though; only the republicans are good with dirty tricks. Just look at the voter ID laws that popped up in — gee — all the swing states: dirty tricks are an art form for republicans.
http://imcravingpresidency.tumblr.com/ SedanChair

Day 90: “This guy gets it” by Dick Cheney
https://launchpad.net/~zak-mckracken Zak McKracken

Not against Obama, but “populist enthusiasm” is not a good thing in my book.
I’d rather have a “properly thought-out decision”. I know campaigning is about hearts more than minds these days (probably has been forever), but where I come from “populism” means telling people whatever they want to hear, get elected, then do whatever you want to do and don’t look back. This is not a good thing. Actually, politicians are too often rewarded for it but in the long term this is exactly what has destroyed and keeps destroying any kind of trust the people have in their politicians.

Don’t persuade potential voters, convince them. It’s sustainable.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  Don’t persuade potential voters, convince them. It’s sustainable.
  
  As it turns out, parties and candidates actually publish position papers. Unfortunately, absolutely nobody reads them except their opponents’ strategists.
sic transit gloria C.F.A.

Commenting system is buggy – I typed this as a reply to someone, had to log in, and it forgot where it was supposed to put it and put it at the end.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  That seems to be not uncommon. Unfortunately.
  - Maria Moliner
    
    Please add a “do not like” button for BB comments! (and don’t sum them with “like” votes, show both counts separately).
    - IronEdithKidd
      
      As long as it’s not anonymous downvoting.
sic transit gloria C.F.A.

I was all ready to go and vote for Jill Stein until I read the comments here from third-party advocates. Yes, I too am thoroughly sick of Obama’s lies, broken promises, and general betrayal of much that he seemed to value when he was a senator. I’m particularly incensed over the treatment of Bradley Manning.

But this is the system we have. There are two major parties, and a non-parliamentary system, and no proportional representation, and no instant-runoff or Condorcet. Remember how Bush got elected in 2000? The margin in Florida was much smaller than the number of votes for Nader. Under the current rules, voting to the left of the Democrat only helps the Republican. The spoiler effect is built into the system, and the only way to fix that is to change the Constitution.

Now, one point is that if Romney wins, it will really energize the hell out of the Occupy movement and get people interested in fixing the system. This is true. And what would be the result of that? Lots of people getting pepper-sprayed and beaten and arrested, and maybe a few minor concessions that would amount to less than we’d get from Obama. And that’s about it. They’re not making much headway under Obama – why the hell would they manage to do more under Romney?

Given Citizens United and everything else that’s happened, it’s possible that the system is broken beyond repair and will take a revolution to fix. Yeah, good luck with that – look how it turned out in Iran and Russia. Think about who owns most of the guns in this country. It’s not the people on the left. Think about how well educated those people are, and what they believe. You say you want a revolution? With those starting conditions? Really?

I really think the only realistic chance to fix this country is to keep voting for the lesser evil, let them appoint Justices who are at least decent people, and keep hammering at the need to fix the fundamentals – the electoral system, money in politics, and most of all, the horribly undereducated and gullible electorate. A democracy always – always! – gets the government they deserve. It doesn’t speak well of us that we’ve gotten this one. We need to do better.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_CHSSLIBJKD2WK4JWHWATQDNAWI D

Number 5 Number5 Number 5.
Tetsubo Kanamono

I’m voting for Obama for the same reason I voted for Kerry, I don’t want the Republican to win.
Pope Ratzo

Sounds good. Rosanne Barr for President!