Conformist voting as a bad idea
What really sticks in my mind about the 2024 election is Jill Stein's explanation of why the Muslims of Dearborn, Michigan voted for Donald Trump and not for her. As Stein explained it, the Muslims of Dearborn, Michigan voted for Donald Trump to punish Kamala Harris for supporting a genocide.
The problem with such a strategy, given its obvious result, is that the end-result of it is another term for Donald Trump. Of course, in discussing Donald Trump it is essential that we distinguish between the actual Donald Trump and the scary fairy tale the Democrats have made of him. Omigod Trump's going to be a DICTATOR! They shouted. Of course, if the elites whose yard-sign printing presses created this show of raw fear had actually been the least bit concerned that Trump was going to be some sort of evil dictator, they wouldn't have granted his party the trifecta he received at the beginning of this month. So, no, they're fine with it, and the Democrat rank and file is being played.
(To be honest, I don't see this situation ever changing. The Democrats in power will only be satisfied if the rank-and-file is denied the least microgram of say-so over what the party does, and so if the Republicans keep their trifecta for the next twenty election cycles, their goal in life has been achieved. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz for President in 2028 anyone?)
So I am happy to see fewer people being played. I am also happy to see Ms. Middle Management losing an election (given that she was never competent to run nor to govern). But I am not happy that we get another President Trump as a result. Here is the TMI show, laying out with Mark Sleboda why we are likely to get another four years of lazy incompetence:
So yeah. Y'all Dearborn, Michigan Muslims accomplished your goal of punishing Kamala Harris. But some of you may have noticed in retrospect that it didn't do anything of substance! Conversely, all the nice liberals with their "Democracy or Dictator" signs were, in their vast collective effort, unable to prop up Ms. Middle Management. Which brings me to my topic here: conformist voting.
Everyone in American pseudo-democracy votes according to their best hearsay about how everyone else is going to vote. Vote for Candidate X to keep Candidate Y out of office: that is America's motto of its bullsh*t notion of "strategic voting." And this strategy has been a spectacular failure for the masses, though to be sure it has brought some spectacular successes to some people who would otherwise be hot in pursuit of their next custodial temp jobs.
Let me suggest an alternative strategy: nonconformist voting. Vote for candidates you think are the best ones. So your candidates lose. It's not a big deal, because under your current assumption about voting, you are losing big-time in every election cycle.
Okay? Okay.
Comments
Jill Stein reminds me of some of these surfers I've seen
Of course, since it's November, I can only watch surfers on YouTube.
At any rate, you have these surfers who go out into the Pacific Ocean only to discover that the waves are crap. They're too small, and they don't last very long. Yet these surfers stay out there anyway, and they still look good riding the waves, because they're good surfers, even though they may only be out there for a little while.
“The loyal Left cannot act decisively. Their devotion to the system is a built-in kill switch limiting dissent.” - Richard Moser
I disagree
So long as anyone believes that voting will make a difference, that person is mistaken -- the permanent government controls the politicians, not the other way around. Voting for the reincarnation
of Gene Debs -- or a whole Congress full of Perfect Angels of Anti-Imperialism -- will only bring down the hammer from the uber-mafia that has the armed forces and the cops at their disposal. And an infinity of Lee Harvey Osgoods for individual assassinations.
Getting into a position where that is no longer reality is the task ahead. Voting does almost nothing toward that end.
I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.
Then bring on the military
The US is still a lawless oligarchy because it only ONCE came close to dealing with a situation like the one you describe, in 1968. And, in 1968, the rebellion against empire in the US (as opposed to the rebellion against US empire, which had some subsequent successes, notably in Nicaragua in 1979 and in Venezuela in 1999) discovered that it only had the power to prune out the worst cases of armed idiocy, and those were occurring on the battlefields of Vietnam (e.g. "fragging"). The point of "fragging" was nonetheless not lost on the shadow government of that time: if you rely upon the military too much, there are consequences. 1968 was, moreover, in the midst of a cultural revolution which resonates to this day, and it inspired the birth of the Peace and Freedom Party of California, a very small thing, but a good one nonetheless. (There were also the Yippies; too bad they also remained small.) Said rebellion didn't have the strength to prop up the Black Panthers as opposed to the FBI of COINTELPRO, but what if it did?
And as for voting, the public repudiated Johnson only to elect Nixon. It could have done better than that, but it didn't, because it was too early. It is no longer too early.
At the current juncture, "the vote" has been used so stupidly that it has granted us a genocide and a mass slaughter with no end in sight. The groups in power, both outgoing and incoming, do not get the idea that overuse of the military has consequences, although they are starting to realize this fact of life in Lebanon and with the Israel-Iran exchanges. I am suggesting an end to the practice of hearsay voting, and not in nonvoting, which hasn't changed anything either. Remember, it is in Chomsky's endorsement of hearsay voting that he deviates from anarchism and stops being an anarchist altogether.
Sure, voting doesn't do a lot. But it can do more than nothing, which is mostly what it did this year. Voting did, however, persuade the Harris campaign to run anti-Stein ads, a waste of seven figures of money. But that was the sort of voting I am recommending.
“The loyal Left cannot act decisively. Their devotion to the system is a built-in kill switch limiting dissent.” - Richard Moser
Bring on the military?
I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.
They haven't been for everybody
The Greens haven't been for everybody. Consistent with this diary, I would argue that the primary failure, here, has been the twin one-size-fits-all pseudo-resistance concepts, such that the Trump voters think they are resisting Project Ukraine, and the Biden/Harris voters think they are resisting the racism and sexism of the Trump voters. Au contraire, we get genuine resistance when people focus on what counts as actually resisting. One way in which this will show up will be when they vote for actual resistances, instead of the usual concern for hearsay.
“The loyal Left cannot act decisively. Their devotion to the system is a built-in kill switch limiting dissent.” - Richard Moser
Caitlin Johnstone on voting:
Read on blog or Reader
Site logo image Caitlin Johnstone
When The Show Is Over, The Actors Hold Hands And Take A Bow
By Caitlin Johnstone on November 14, 2024 --
I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.
A casual reading of my previous diary
You've got post-mortem now complaining of the Dems' campaign
might suggest that I already knew all this stuff, and could throw in some more specifics for good measure. To quote:
Watching old George Carlin routines, you can tell there's something distinctly American about him, especially in this one:
We'll be watching America's decline for the next few years, now. When the America of the future looks like a white version of today's Haiti, maybe people will listen to us.
“The loyal Left cannot act decisively. Their devotion to the system is a built-in kill switch limiting dissent.” - Richard Moser
A few thoughts come to mind here:
Jill Stein has had, how long, ten years at least, to make the Green Party into a force to be reckoned with. The Progressives, at the turn of the 20thC elected governors, mayors and senators, and saw much of their program enacted into law.
Sorry to offend against multiculturalism, but the Muslims of Dearborn are getting a lot more publicity and attention than they deserve. I don't see too many of them stepping off the ladder of success in America to return to the ME and fight the hated Israelis. Looks to me like BOTH sides expect us to do their fighting for them. The Dumbocrats should never have abandoned Howard Dean's 50 state strategy.
Conformism. The advertising industry has spent a century and more convincing Americans that respectability lies in conformity. That is why, IMO, so called 'undecideds' wait to see who the winner is likely to be, because they don't want to feel out of step with the majority. Out of step means you are a weirdo.
I hope four years of lazy incompetence is the worst we get. It would appear that war with Iran is in the cards. So much for Trump will keep us out of war.
Mary Bennett
The progressives of 1900-1925
The Democrats, moreover, became a support structure for the Republican Party. When push comes to shove they will, like Gore and Kerry in the Zeros, imitate Republican platforms only to concede in November to the Republican when evidence of rigged elections comes up. That's their best effort; that's what pissed Ralph Nader off.
Their peak effectiveness, as such, came during Obama's tenure as President when they conceded 900+ state legislative seats to the Republicans. The most prominent point of my diary here is to deprive the Democrats of reasons for existing. In this regard, individual Democrats would greatly benefit from 1) therapy and 2) self-reinvention as "third party" politicos.
As for lazy incompetence, remember that Team Biden has done a great deal of damage to the world while Joe was taking extensive naps or staring off into space. Watch for that.
“The loyal Left cannot act decisively. Their devotion to the system is a built-in kill switch limiting dissent.” - Richard Moser
Dem v. GOP
Huh?
Fight them with what? Palestinians don’t have an army that can go up against Israeli bombs and tanks. It’s why they are getting slaughtered and their country is in ruins.
Palestinians, Muslims and Arabs aren’t asking for us to fight for them. They are asking our government to stop arming Israel so that people can stop being slaughtered.
You and ban nock can question why they refused to vote for Kamala all you want, but they said they wouldn’t vote for the regime that is slaughtering their families. I didn’t hear them say that it’s the economy. And yes they had the right to vote for whoever they wanted. They didn’t owe Kamala their vote.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
I never said they owed anyone their vote.
It is high time the intelligence, you should excuse the expression, agencies be prohibited from resettling their pets and proteges in the US.
Mary Bennett
From the horses mouth
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/us-muslims-arab-americans-criticise-l...
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
Unless told otherwise, I'd guess the Muslims of
Dearborn Michigan voted for Trump for economic reasons, and secondly to stop illegal migration. Just like everyone else. I'd have to see good statistical polling from someone reputable to think otherwise. Obviously they liked Trump better than the other choices.
Well, their spokespersons
I might have believed about half of what they were saying. Obviously, they can vote for whomever they like and are not required to explain themselves. I do think, and repeat, that the Dems. et al are giving this one minority group far too much attention.
Mary Bennett
When Americans use their vote to agree and consent
.
....to the deplorable choices that are forced on them — then they end up with the government they deserve.
Intellectually honest people withhold their consent. They do not play games in which they are the designated losers.
They seek winning strategies outside the box.
Winning strategies outside the box, is it?
Mary Bennett