...not the one you wish you had.
Ralph Nader supporters need to remember that, when they get on their kick of "if we only had instant run-offs, Nader wouldn't throw the election to anyone, so it's not his fault that he's vanity runs are threatening more years of GOP domination."
Something always strikes me as fundamentally undemocratic about accusing Nader of spoiling the election for the Democrats. If there's a portion of the electorate that will vote for someone like Nader, the Democrats are by no means entitled to those votes and should do something to convince them that their candidate is the best choice rather than pressuring him not to run or asking his supporters to vote D simply for strategic value. If the Democrats adopted his suggested electoral reforms as part of their platform, for example, many Nader supporters might genuinely and happily vote for a Democrat.
ReplyDeleteI think the point of the argument isn't to forget what our electoral system is, but to argue that the Democrats -- who have far more power than the Greens -- should attempt to fix the system, rather than perpetually whining about spoilers.
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