“I’m just exploring all my options”

July 25, 2016

maverick-ornithography:
sitta-pusilla:
You have no options. Voting for a third party candidate is effectively throwing your vote away. It’s a BINARY CHOICE.
You are going to get us all killed.
You are going to get us all killed.
You might not remember what happened last time, but I do. Leftists swore up and down an Al Gore Presidency would be “just as bad” as a Bush Presidency. That was the EXACT phrase they used.
“Al Gore is a corpratist,” they said.
“I want to vote for something instead of against something,” they said.
Now, over a decade later, the entire GLOBE is still trying to correct what was done during the Bush administration–global financial collapse, SCOTUS nominees, TWO endless wars, drone strikes, the Patriot Act, No Child Left Behind, Isis, DICK CHEYNEY.
Open your eyes and see how the tide is turning. For the past 10 years, there’s been a steady rise of right-wing ideology and politics. There’s UKIP and the Brexit, France and their damn neo Nazi Marine Le Pen, whatever is happening in Brazil right now. Canada only just ousted a leader who muzzled scientists who spoke about climate change!
And now we have the possibility of Trump. Trump who, as of this moment, has a 38% chance of winning according to Five Thirty Eight. Not 38% of the vote. 38% chance of winning. Those aren’t terrible odds. They’re better odds than rolling a specific number on a die, 16.68%.
Do you understand that we have a chance to flip the Supreme Court for the first time since the 60’s?
Remember all that Civil Rights shit from the 60’s? Do you know what happened to it, why it didn’t usher in a new age of equality like MLK’s Dreamers hoped? The Burger Court happened to it. The Burger Court is the conservative-majority Supreme Court that came into power in the backlash following the 60′s. With that Court came a conservative jurisprudence that would last for generations. It was the Burger Court that stymied de-segregation efforts, and created ‘white flight’ by ruling that de-segregation orders couldn’t be extended past district lines. It was the Burger Court that laid the groundwork for Citizens United, when they ruled that corporations could spend money in politics. Everyone was so shocked when SCOTUS ruled corporations are people and money=speech. Well, thank the Burger Court!
Now, for the first time in SEVERAL DECADES there is an opportunity to flip the Supreme Court. We haven’t had a liberal jurisprudence since the 60′s. And look at what’s coming down the pipe–anti trans laws like HB2, Affirmative Action, housing rights, repealing Citizen United, immigration, abortion, gun control, police brutality, climate change, etc.
I am begging you to vote Hillary. And tell others to vote Hillary. I won’t quibble over whether her policies are better than Trump’s (they objectively are) or whether or not she is a better person than Trump (that’s…more subjective). The SCOTUS nominations should be reason enough. PLEASE don’t make me live through a Trump administration. Please don’t do this again.
Latina trans woman chiming in to add that I am doing my damnedest to get all of my documents updated before the election, because if that two-chambers russian roulette chance pops up I want to at least have everything in order.

But even then, if Trump wins there’s a very good chance that I will die. Three trans women have been murdered within twenty-five miles of my house in the past NINE MONTHS, and I live in a fairly liberal state. If Federal law turns against me, I lose what little protections I have, and my risk of death by murder skyrockets.

And that’s not even looking at healthcare! Currently I am only able to obtain HRT because in my state Medicaid is required to cover transgender health services. With a Republican Supreme Court and Congress, not only does that go out the window but so does Obamacare and the Medicaid expansion which is how I have health insurance in the first place.

If you care even the slightest bit about my safety as a human being, you will
GO OUT AND VOTE CLINTON AND DEMOCRATIC ALL THE WAY DOWN THE BALLOT
This is absolutely about survival, and a Trump presidency will in no uncertain terms be anathema to my continued existence. Please, I beg of you: help me stay alive.
Fuck y’all and fuck this false dilemma bullshit.
The fact that so many people are apathetic about Trump and Clinton being the nominees for this election cycle means that third parties CAN ACTUALLY BE CONSIDERED MINOR PARTIES BY THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.
Let me break it down for you:
The reason why third-parties are considered a “waste of a vote” is because they lack the resources to get on state ballots and run effective advertising campaigns. The fact that the Commission on Presidential Debates is specifically set up to keep third-party candidates from making it to the debate stage (thus gaining much-needed exposure) doesn’t help this at all. Hell, there are actually pending lawsuits against the CPD for potentially violating antitrust laws because of those shenanigans.
If a third-party receives just 5% of the popular vote, they become eligible for the Presidential Election Campaign Fund’s grant, by way of FEC rules. To put this into perspective: If the Libertarian party had gotten 5% of the vote in 2012, they would start the 2016 election with $10 million. That is literally four times the amount the party raised by donations in 2012.
“BUT ROSS PEROT MANAGED TO GET ON THE BALLOT IN EVERY STATE, AND HE GOT A HIGH POPULAR VOTE!” some of you might say. Yeah, well Ross Perot was also a fucking billionaire who could finance it himself.
People don’t realize that the system is rigged to ensure that the two-party system survives, and part of that is mental manipulation like this shit here. The two-party system fails when you get to points like these, where you have a madman and a warhawk running. This is why I’m voting third-party, because even though I know I’m not voting for a winning candidate, I’m voting to try and change the fucking system so we won’t have these sorts of shit elections again.
Also, y’all really need to start a movement for getting rid of the electoral college because literally, the only votes that matter as far as the EC is concerned are the ones in battleground states.

First, how dare you try to override marginalized voices to tell them that they are somehow ignorant for putting their personal safety ahead of your selfish third-party pipe dreams. How fucking dare you.

Second, what happens if your precious Gary Johnson wins a couple of states? The election is then decided by the House of Representatives, which is currently controlled by the Republican Party. Which means, President Donald Trump.

Third, there is a moral imperative for voting for Clinton. Trump absolutely must be stopped for the security of not only the United States, but for the world. His radical ideas of “bombing the hell out of [ISIL]” can, in all likelihood, spark World War III. Knowing how much of a loose cannon he is, he can get angry at a country not kissing his feet at the UN and seek military action against them. That puts literally every person in the world at risk. I know, because you’re a cishet white man, you won’t be able to properly empathize with the marginalized people’s pleas for their personal safety. But maybe if you understand that a Trump presidency has the potential to start a nuclear war, you’ll make the correct choice and vote for the immediate future over the hypothetical one.

4:53am | URL: https://tmblr.co/ZKqU3i29noztM

(Notes: 36,675)

Filed under: politics