Re: Peace & Freedom VT

>Stop living in the past Adam....
>
>Anthony Gierzynski, a political science professor at UVM, has an  
>excellent book about the fundamental reasons for what Vicki said,  
>called Money Rules.  I highly recommend it.  However vibrant the third  
>parties were 150 years or so ago, can you name one (besides  
>independents that don't belong to any party like Bernie) that has  
>gained significant national office in the last 30?

I have to admit that you're right on the count that things have not been good for third parties in the past 150 years - but aren't the negative effects on the populace obvious? I feel as if the only reason people can put up against third parties is that they haven't been successful recently. Vermont didn't have a democratic governor until sometime in the 50's I think, when Hoff got elected. This is after almost 200 years of history. The democrats didn't pack it in and say, "Well, 200 years, there's no way we can change this. I guess Vermont is just a one-party state." 

Regardless, as I said in the previous email, I'm not talking about success within the current system - I said it's impossible. Gierzynski is a highly intelligent man, but the book you're referring to is mainly about campaign finance reform, which really needs to have a set system in place to be analyzed; i.e. he needs to assume that the way things have been recently is the way things will continue to be (relative to the number and power of individual parties) to make any semblance of a factual thesis. 

And honestly, the success of my ideals is secondary to my right to have them and to vote for whom I feel is the best candidate - not the guy with the best chance to beat Bush, not the guy who "mostly" agrees with me. Hey, if the Democratic Party went with Kucinich, they'd have my vote. They chose not to, and I choose not to support a party that doesn't agree with me. 

Winning an election is not a goal here, also like I said before. Maybe in 30 years, but for now, I'd settle for a third party getting the 5% needed for matching funds. If you ask me, Gore stole THAT from Nader with his bullshit centrist message from last election, a hell of a lot more than Nader stole anything from Gore. I mean, recounts showed that Gore won the election anyway. The derisiveness shown against third parties by those in the majority, especially those claiming to be "democrats" (little d), is pretty sad. 

Ask yourself this: Should the party serve the people, or should the people serve the party? Just because enough people were disappointed enough to desert the party, don't blame them for this disillusionment. If the party bothered to go further left, it could reabsorb these people. Then, if Nader or whoever the scape goat will be this time runs, the people who would have voted for him would vote for a Dem instead. The problem is NOT with the third parties "moving in" on Democratic votes - the problem is with the two parties moving so close together (and, since 9/11, further right) that the voter who cares more about ideology than voting for a winner has to go elsewhere to vote with their conscience.

And, honestly - look at this website. We rail on so many things that our government is involved with, and no matter who gets elected (shit, probably even Nader), we'll still find large amounts of changes that need to be made. So are we to sit here and criticize while we vote in someone who is already well-established within the circles of government that have made and continue to make these decisions that piss us off so much? Personally, I would feel very hypocritical doing that, and I really feel that if enough people knew about their options, things would be much better off for everyone EXCEPT the Dumocrats and Retardlicans (I just made those up - pretty funny, right?). 

Regardless of who you're voting for, don't more options seem better, especially when the black and white disparities that used to actually exist between candidates have been foregone for charcoal and grey?


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