this post was submitted on 08 Feb 2025
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I wish it were bullshit. It's just math and some pretty basic political science. There is no way to get even the majority of the Democratic voters base to switch at the same time, and if the shift is gradual the vote is split (whomever you want to say is splitting it) and we lose everything.
It's also a juvenile fantasy - the dream of just starting from scratch and getting right this time. There are tens of thousands of elected seats in state and federal government - nevermind local. For a party to threaten the Democrats, they would need a large percentage of those offices. State government runs elections and decides who gets on the ballot. You can't just bypass it. The moment you are a threat, ballot access will be pulled out of reach.
Assuming you could put together a large enough coalition to overcome these obstacles, you are going to have a hell of a time keeping the same corrupting forces from taking over. How many times have we elected politicians with progressive rhetoric only to see them turn on us once elected?
Anyone who has the clout to build a party from scratch, keep it on target, and displace one of two ruling parties would be more than capable of taking a party over, and would do so much more easily with a lot less risk.
You could use the exact same arguments you have for not voting at all, because a single vote doesn't matter.
Unfortunately, that is also a fact
Yup, exactly. And that's exactly what I mean about a third party. It needs to happen yesterday and it needs to ignore the "they can't get in because it just splits the vote" crowd. It needs to be better than the democrats in every way that counts and it needs to do what the people want. So that nobody can go "a single vote doesn't matter".