You hear it every election year. Those 5 little words, strung together to make up the biggest lie in politics: "You're throwing your vote away." The media even has a name for the candidates that get the "throw away" votes. They call those candidates "spoilers". Why? Because it ruins the whole two-party myth. It shows evidence that there are more choices out there than tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum.

The two major parties are beginning to realize this too. No longer can they sit back as the Greens, Constitutionalists, Libertarians, and Independent Americans take away a percentage of the votes. They can't rely on people to automatically disregard these third parties any more as "fringe groups" because the fringe is getting awfully big. Instead they try to scare you into believing that a vote for a third party is a vote for the opposition. For example, when Ralph Nader announced his candidacy for President in 2004, the Democrats began rounding up the troops with threats that support for Nader is really support for Bush in disguise. In their opinions, John Kerry has the only real chance of beating Bush, and therefore is the only candidate worth anyone's support.

It's not that I defend Ralph Nader, in fact my viewpoint is quite the contrary. My support will go to Michael Peroutka (www.peroutka2004.com), and I'm sure Republican campaign against him will come closer to election day. They'll scare their big supporters into believing that a vote for Peroutka is a vote for John Kerry.
It's an age old tactic, do whatever you can to get votes. Run emotionally charged commercials, scare people with trumped up charges and exaggerated claims about the opponent, kiss babies, jump on band wagons, hold whistle stop tours, sign autographs, throw out first pitches at ball games, use every press opportunity as a campaign commercial, do whatever you can to get elected. Unfortunately, in the effort to score as many votes as possible, the two major parties often forget one thing . . . principle. How much do they really believe in their principles if they are willing to sacrifice them so freely for a vote?

For years the two parties have followed the same model of getting elected. They run to the left or right during the primaries, and run to the center in the general election. What we are left with is two candidates essentially saying the same thing, but disagreeing in name only, and occasionally on implementation of the same policies. This year is no different. Bush pushed the Patriot act because he is interested in removing God given rights from Americans. Kerry opposes the Patriot act, but that doesn't mean he's not interested in taking away American's God given rights. He'll still try to take our second amendment. He'll still seek to hold "terrorists" without legal aid or trial. He'll accomplish the same things Bush would, just under a different banner and in different ways. It's politics. It's the system. It's anything but principled.

When you ask people why they vote for a candidate, they give you a few basic answers. For one, they may actually truly believe in the candidate and his policies. This is rare in the two-party system, but it does happen. Another reason many people give is because the candidate is the lesser of two evils. Some say that although they disagree with the candidate on some things "at least he's not the other guy." They imply with this thinking that there are no other choices, despite the emergence of viable third parties for both the left and the right.
The lesser of two evils argument frustrates the daylights out of me when I hear it. First of all, it is a flawed argument. As I've demonstrated above, in the general election, the parties run to the center. The result of this is that both parties become the big tent party. What has happened in America is that both parties have gotten so good at running to the center that they are almost exactly alike. There is no "lesser" in the lesser of two evils.

Since when is voting for evil a good thing? Does it matter if you drive a car off a cliff at 55 MPH or 80 MPH? Either way, you're driving off the cliff. A vote for the lesser of two evils is a vote for evil, plain and simple. It doesn't take a master's degree to figure this out.

How many Americans grumble every year that all politicians are only in office for their own interests? The basis of these feelings is that Government has not progressed in America for nearly 100 years. There have been some victories on both sides of the spectrum, but for the most part, we've been in the same rut of one step forward and two steps back. Yet, these same Americans who complain about the hole we're in, get out their two-party shovels on election day and dig us further in the hole by perpetuating the heart of the problem: The two-party system itself. If you want to change Government, change your vote.

I spent a week really campaigning for my candidate to my circle of conservative friends and acquaintances recently. I got the same response over and over again. "I would vote for Peroutka if I thought he had a chance of winning. However, even though I agree with nearly everything he says, he can't possibly win, so I would be throwing my vote away, or worse yet, actually voting for John Kerry." What they didn't realize is that if they all vote for him, we are all actually that much closer to having someone we actually want in office, instead of someone we barely tolerate.
If someone were to open up the curtain at the voting booth and say to you "I voted for Ralph Nader, so you must vote for him too", what would you do? I'd punch him in the nose even if I was a Nader supporter. No one has any right to tell you how to vote, let alone control your vote. So then why do we base our votes on what polls say or a candidate's popularity rating? You wouldn't let anyone look over your shoulder and tell you what to do when you fill out your ballot, so why let them look over your shoulder and tell you what to do beforehand?

A good percentage of people who voted for Bush and Gore in 2000 didn't really like the candidate they choose, but felt like they were, at least in a small way, better than the other guy. A portion of those people (dare I say; a majority of those people?) actually liked another third party candidate a lot better, but felt they would be throwing their vote away if they voted for who they really wanted. Look at the big picture. If all of those people actually voted for who they wanted, we would have had a four horse race, most likely George Bush, Al Gore, Ralph Nader, and Howard Phillips. How hard would it have been for any of those candidates to get 25% of the vote if everyone voted for who they believed in, instead of who they were scared or manipulated into voting for?

The two parties don't care about you. They care about power. They care about winning elections, no matter the cost. They've abandoned the American people and their needs. They've forgotten that the rights Americans enjoy are to be protected, not manipulated. They don't care to hold to the constitution's limitations. This must change, but will not change if we continue to give them our support. If you want government to reflect your principles, vote for candidates and parties that reflect those principles, no exceptions. The only result of holding to principle is government changing for the better, one individual vote at a time. Changing government for the better is not throwing your vote away. Quite the contrary, it is using it properly.


-Why Voting for a Third Party Candidate is NOT Throwing your Vote Away
Jason Marianna, President - Yay God! Ministries
jason@yaygod.org
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