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Fonze

I made a huge mistake today

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Well? Who did you vote for? The demon or the i-dont-believe-in-climate-change businessman?

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Voros said:

Well? Who did you vote for?

Is it allowed in the US to say that in the election day?

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printz said:

Is it allowed in the US to say that in the election day?

No you fool people get shot in the street for that on election day geez

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I took a coin in the booth with me. I flipped it. Heads for the carrot. Tails for the prune. It landed on heads. I flipped it again. Tails this time. Then tails. Then heads. And so on...

After 50 flips, at last I came to a decision.

I voted for the coin.

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Y'know, that comparison is so one-sided when you think about it. Finding a malignant tumor early can lead to it being pretty easy to deal with, and even when it's developed into full-on cancer it can still usually be removed if you don't dawdle, sometimes even relatively simply depending on the type. Meanwhile, we're still struggling to find a way to deal with AIDS, meaning it's at best permanently crippling and at worst a very, very painful death sentence.

I mean, neither is remotely desirable, but unless you slap several more adjectives onto cancer or change the question it's not that hard of a choice - especially since, y'know, you'll know you're getting cancer, so you can take preventative measures immediately and keep it from spiraling out of control.

ninja edit: actually I just realized all this logic relies on health care being an option, and since we're talking about America ...

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printz said:

Is it allowed in the US to say that in the election day?

Of course it is.

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I get to vote later. But I'm drinking before I do. The ballot will probably end up saying Gene Simmons or something. He's the Demon, after all.

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Fonze said:

I voted for 1 of the 2 criminals...

I feel dirty.


You shouldn't. Voter turnout has been very low for a very long time. Casting your vote may seem directly ineffective, it does help to sway the direction of your state in a direction of your choosing and help put some perspective into the electoral college when selecting the president.

A lot of dumb people feel extremely entitled to vote and are first in line at the ballots, while the smart people who understand that its far more complicated than that are often undecided or protesting the system by not voting. This is contributes to things getting as bad as they are.

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I came the conclusion a long time ago that it doesn't matter. Regardless of which one gets in, America will get the President it deserves.

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darknation said:

I came the conclusion a long time ago that it doesn't matter. Regardless of which one gets in, America will get the President it deserves.

We basically get the uncomfortable buttplug we deserve.

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printz said:

Is it allowed in the US to say that in the election day?

Interesting that you ask; are there countries where it isn't allowed to say?

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40oz said:

A lot of dumb people feel extremely entitled to vote and are first in line at the ballots, while the smart people who understand that its far more complicated than that are often undecided or protesting the system by not voting. This is contributes to things getting as bad as they are.


Those "smart" people don't sound very smart. All the undecided people and protest voters should be voting a third party - any third party. Makes the numbers tell a story that might knock some sense in the medium term into all those bipartisan (UGH!!!) electoral institutions. (Seriously, how is it legal to have the two big parties involved in debate commissions and baked into election laws?)

Perhaps America needs a group of rich folk to set out to create a movement that upsets elections. There has to be a way to crack the two-party thinking most Americans seem to exhibit. Maybe vote buying would work. People love iPads, and ballot selfies are way more legal than they ought to be.

fraggle said:

Interesting that you ask; are there countries where it isn't allowed to say?


That is an interesting question. I could imagine some states trying it to combat vote buying and intimidation, but of course people can just lie. I can see why why it's common to prohibit cameras in voting booths for that reason (although with a paper ballot you could potentially take two and take a misleading photo).

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darknation said:

I came the conclusion a long time ago that it doesn't matter. Regardless of which one gets in, America will get the President it deserves.

It kinda does matter, it's just that it's the effect occurs on the macro level rather than the micro. Think about it, around 60% of people will vote in this election--if we could magically persuade the non-voters to cast a ballot for Vermin Supreme, he would become our new president. The problem lies in the mass perception that one vote does not matter (which is admittedly true for a nationwide event) but absolutely adds up if you, your friends, and your associates also believe this.

In kind of an existential fashion, it's best if we push the Sisyphean boulder uphill to inspire others to do so, rather than succumb to despair. Sure, it's an absurdist task to assume your vote will change anything, but encouraging/spreading disenfranchisement only serves to spread that erroneous behavior which literally aids no one. Incremental change is still change, and wouldn't it be better to be a part of it rather than letting history pass you by?

Also great to see everyone propping up the intellectually dishonest "lesser of two evils" argument, as if the way the new SCOTUS pick leans is completely irrelevant to the rights of minorities, right?

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If I was living in the US I would vote but it would probably be for a BS candidate like Ken Bone or something. If enough of you "I'm not gonna vote cause fuck da system" people would just cast votes that aren't for the 2 mains it would at the very least send the message that the American people are not happy with these garbage choices and the overall false dichotomy the US functions under. Just my take

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I dragged myself out of bed at 5am to vote at the high school. I was expecting or hoping for something more electric but alas, was greeted with a polite line of latte sipping 40 somethings and smiling old ladies. Maybe The Donald won't concede defeat and I can blend into the angry mob and throw a flaming trash barrel through a plate glass window before the end of the week.

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I couldn't give a rat's ass about who is to trash the US political system even further than it already is. What bothers me is that Trump likes Putin, and that's not good for the rest of the world.

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Doomkid said:

If I was living in the US I would vote but it would probably be for a BS candidate like Ken Bone or something. If enough of you "I'm not gonna vote cause fuck da system" people would just cast votes that aren't for the 2 mains it would at the very least send the message that the American people are not happy with these garbage choices and the overall false dichotomy the US functions under. Just my take


That does happen, it just happens more noticeably on the local and state elections. I've voted third party in the last three presidential elections, and it's not just a protest vote. I voted for the people who I thought would be the people we need to run the country; not the people we deserve. I realized they would never win, but I have a clear conscience when it comes to my voting record. I never felt like I was voting for the lesser evil.

In my state it was very very rare to see a third party for State Senate, or even county electoral districts when I started voting. Now, they're by no means common, but in the last two or three elections I've seen far more independents, particularly Libertarians running, and quite a few running for re-election.

It works, it just takes time, and the Republicans and Democrats have taken notice, and at times turn down their rhetoric when they see people leaving the party. Will it make any discernible difference in my life-time? Probably not, but there are small steps and starts that might just make things better. And again, when I go to bed tonight I know that at least I didn't vote for Hillary or Trump.

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Doomkid said:

If enough of you "I'm not gonna vote cause fuck da system" people would just cast votes that aren't for the 2 mains it would at the very least send the message that the American people are not happy with these garbage choices and the overall false dichotomy the US functions under. Just my take


I 100% disagree. People think they're making a different by writing shit in but they'll just be seen as the idiotic tiny percent who handed the election over.

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dobu gabu maru said:

It kinda does matter, it's just that it's the effect occurs on the macro level rather than the micro. Think about it, around 60% of people will vote in this election--if we could magically persuade the non-voters to cast a ballot for Vermin Supreme, he would become our new president.

In which case Vermin Supreme wins, and America will get the President it deserves.

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Doomkid said:

If I was living in the US I would vote but it would probably be for a BS candidate like Ken Bone or something. If enough of you "I'm not gonna vote cause fuck da system" people would just cast votes that aren't for the 2 mains it would at the very least send the message that the American people are not happy with these garbage choices and the overall false dichotomy the US functions under. Just my take

welcome to the system where all the people who'll actually look at your vote will do is raise an eyebrow and mock you while laughing before shoving it into the furnace and going on with the rest of the votes

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I voted. I feel pretty good about it. I think a good proportion of politicians start out their career with good intentions, wanting to make a positive difference. But then most of them become corrupt, via blackmail, or greed, or they become power drunk. Extreme pressure is applied to those that go against the established way "things are done."

What further complicates things are the fact that the candidates are human (presumably :), and they have flaws, and skeletons in their closets, and personal agendas, and biases, all of which are natural human traits. These flaws often get spun out of control. And, occasionally, a candidate actually does some unforgivable stuff.

Then there's the voters. With all the campaign smear tactics, and media misinformation, mnay people are left concentrating on the most superficial qualities, as if they were choosing their favorite band: "Wow, she/he reminds me of a friend I had in high school", or "What a nice smile!". I wonder what percentage of voters actually compare the candidate's views...

So, to make a difference (legally), you can either devote your life to politics, or you can vote. The vote might not make much of a difference, but it's the best I can do. So I voted.

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Bit of a politics/history junkie here. I felt great about voting and this election is probably the most entertaining cycle I will ever get to witness in my lifetime. If you think US politics went down the shitter sometime in the 21st century, I welcome you to the party. We've been waiting for you. Personally I think the US has had problems for an incredibly long time. How can a country be founded on individualism, revolution, and property rights and then turn into a unipolar hegemony over global politics without having some intense cognitive dissonance? US politics have been crazy in terms of their impact on the rest of the world as well as their massive corruption. The foundation of the US political system is very, very young. It is chaotic and apparently prone to long states of gridlock and bipartisan consensual corruption.

Also some political scientists are saying they learned some great things during this cycle. For one, they can isolate what happens when one candidate uses positive and negative ads and the other candidate sometimes uses nothing at all. It is rare for one side to use almost all the ads and the other side not even put up a fight.

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Maybe if we bury a dollar today, and dig it up a year latter, it will be worth $10000 after the economy collapses in a year.

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Arctangent said:

welcome to the system where all the people who'll actually look at your vote will do is raise an eyebrow and mock you while laughing before shoving it into the furnace and going on with the rest of the votes

A system that discounts votes they don't like is just grand isn't it

No but seriously a non-mainstream candidate vote is still obviously better than no vote at all. The percentage of people bothering to vote being higher is a good thing. Yes they mean a lot more earlier on, but a larger percentage of people voting outside the proverbial box expresses discontent which is exactly how I feel about our choices. I could not sign my name next to either candidate in good conscience. I could have cast a long distance vote since I'm an American citizen but that's too much assing around just to cast a non-mainstream vote, but if I still lived there I'd prefer to vote than to not vote.

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