What are the options for those like me?

[ChrisL]

I think we really need to get those 3rd party candidates better known somehow. Campaign spending limits? That might even the playing field so that we can finally put an end to the monopoly that the two party system has had on us for so long. Neither party cares about us or the country. It's all about money and power and party politics for them now.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

Vote third party and keep doing your own personal campaigning for your chosen 3rd party candidate. Or you could join the campaign and do some volunteer campaigning for your candidate. You can send emails to your family and friends and post things about your candidate on FB or Twitter.

That's a lot of time and work only to lose anyway. It's like digging a ditch to get the dirt to fill in another ditch right next to it.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

Not being an expert is no reason why Trump should take the advise of the Heritage Foundation. Trump's not an expert at anything president's do and he certainly isn't going to take the advise of experts because he doesn't trust them.

"You know, I’ve always wanted to say this—I’ve never said this before with all the talking we all do—all of these experts, 'Oh we need an expert—' The experts are terrible," he declared. "Look at the mess we’re in with all these experts that we have. Look at the mess. Look at the Middle East. If our presidents and our politicians went on vacation for 365 days a year and went to the beach, we’d be in much better shape right now in the Middle East.”
Donald Trump 04/04/16

Donald Trump will listen to no one but Donald Trump. He never has and he certain is not going to start now.

The President (no matter who he is) has several advisors on any given subject. The President will (as you said) do what he feels is best. But Trump nor anybody else will sit there, read a newspaper, and say "I'm going to do X" all by himself.

When Trump first sprung into action, he stated we need to keep all Muslims out of this country. He backed down after somebody told him there was a sever Constitutional issue there. The Mexicans are sending their criminals and indigent to our country. He back peddled there as well. His comment inferred that all Mexicans are lowlifes which struck a never with Hispanic voters.

So I think you are wrong there. Trump will listen to people. He is very close with Newt Gingrich. He's taken advice from Bill O'Reilly under advisement. Trump may be rude, arrogant, insulting, but Trump is a successful businessman, and successful business people know they can't run the entire operation themselves. If every business person tried to do that, there would be no such thing as managers or supervisors.

 

[ChrisL]

Vote third party and keep doing your own personal campaigning for your chosen 3rd party candidate. Or you could join the campaign and do some volunteer campaigning for your candidate. You can send emails to your family and friends and post things about your candidate on FB or Twitter.

That's a lot of time and work only to lose anyway. It's like digging a ditch to get the dirt to fill in another ditch right next to it.

Says a partisan. A lot of time and work? It's not a lot of work or time.

 

[xband]

Hillary is so corrupt she can't be trusted to run my household budget let alone the country.
Trump is only in it for his own entertainment & possibly his wallet.

Where do I go? Third party is a dead end. Do I just pack my bags & go home so to speak? Cross my fingers & hope our economy survives the next 4 years?

I truly have no idea where to focus my attention. Up to this point I have focused on anti Trump shit in a desperate attempt to see a change at our convention to see help for the down ballets but I'm beginning to see that is a lost cause too. Plus it's making me hated here by both sides rather than just one.

Sucks to be in this jar of sour pickles

When you're up to your neck in alligators, it's easy for forget that the initial objective was to drain the swamp.

 

[AntonToo]

Bill Clinton is a natural campaigner and he loves it. Hillary isn't that good at it and hates. Bill Clinton is more pragmatic and mainstream in his political views. He tends to follow popular sentiment with only a nudge in the direction of ideology. However Hillary takes ideological stands and fights for major changes. They really are quite different. Neither is really that far to left, less so than Obama and most Democrats.

Can you show me an example where their policy position differed??

 

[Mac1958]

This "voting for an alternate party is a wasted vote" thing is a big part of the problem.

No one vote is more important or influential than another, so no vote is wasted.

We'd be far better off if people voted their conscience than just looking for the letter after the name, like obedient little sheep.
.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

Says a partisan. A lot of time and work? It's not a lot of work or time.

Sure it is. But it's fruitless to try and get a third party candidate in. You won't have many followers.

The way I vote (and I'm sure many do) is to keep the worst candidate out of office. In November, I'm not voting to get Donald Trump in the White House, I'm voting to keep Hillary out of it. I can never accomplish that by voting for a third party candidate. Most voters who share my goal realize the same thing.

 

[SwimExpert]

Was Bill Clinton so corrupt he couldn't be trusted to run your budget?

It's amazing to see how different him and his wife get viewed, while you know they are very much on the same page.

How incredibly sexist. Hillary Clinton is her own person. There is absolutely no reason to view her and her husband as "the same" on any level, except for the ridiculously outdated notion that a woman's identity is determined by to whom she is married.

 

[ChrisL]

Says a partisan. A lot of time and work? It's not a lot of work or time.

Sure it is. But it's fruitless to try and get a third party candidate in. You won't have many followers.

The way I vote (and I'm sure many do) is to keep the worst candidate out of office. In November, I'm not voting to get Donald Trump in the White House, I'm voting to keep Hillary out of it. I can never accomplish that by voting for a third party candidate. Most voters who share my goal realize the same thing.

This kind of BS needs to end. People who spread this kind of rhetoric are at least partly responsible for the monopoly the two party system has on our government.

 

[ChrisL]

Says a partisan. A lot of time and work? It's not a lot of work or time.

Sure it is. But it's fruitless to try and get a third party candidate in. You won't have many followers.

The way I vote (and I'm sure many do) is to keep the worst candidate out of office. In November, I'm not voting to get Donald Trump in the White House, I'm voting to keep Hillary out of it. I can never accomplish that by voting for a third party candidate. Most voters who share my goal realize the same thing.

Lol. It is not a lot of work to email people. Where do you get the idea that's a lot of work?

 

[ChrisL]

Volunteering to campaign for your candidate? You do that on your own time. Not a lot of work either.

 

[AntonToo]

Was Bill Clinton so corrupt he couldn't be trusted to run your budget?

It's amazing to see how different him and his wife get viewed, while you know they are very much on the same page.

How incredibly sexist. Hillary Clinton is her own person. There is absolutely no reason to view her and her husband as "the same" on any level, except for the ridiculously outdated notion that a woman's identity is determined by to whom she is married.

Lol wtf? I'm just saying they are a duo and I've never seen them take positions that contradict each other. Hillary's "identity" is no more defined by Bill than Bill's "identity" is defined by Hillary.

Can you point to an example of a policy disagreement between them?

 

[SwimExpert]

Was Bill Clinton so corrupt he couldn't be trusted to run your budget?

It's amazing to see how different him and his wife get viewed, while you know they are very much on the same page.

How incredibly sexist. Hillary Clinton is her own person. There is absolutely no reason to view her and her husband as "the same" on any level, except for the ridiculously outdated notion that a woman's identity is determined by to whom she is married.

Lol wtf? I'm just saying they are a duo and I've never seen them take positions that contradict each other. Hillary's "identity" is no more defined by Bill than Bill's "identity" is defined by Hillary.

Can you point to an example of a policy disagreement between them?

Even if they did hold identical policy opinions in all things, the fact of the matter remains that being President is a job where one leads the government. What other job in the world would you you find it rational to assume that a spouse would perform the same as the first person in filling that role just because they share common opinions? Two doctors married to each other might share the same opinions about the best ways to treat a patient. That does not mean that both doctors are equally skilled as doctors. And it most certainly does not mean that they would be equally skilled at being a hospital administrator.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

This kind of BS needs to end. People who spread this kind of rhetoric are at least partly responsible for the monopoly the two party system has on our government.

So what are you going to do, create a law that states you can't vote for the purpose of keeping a contender out?

If the political views on both sides were closer, there may be room for a third candidate. But our country is drifting further and further apart in political ideology. On the right, people want to go further right into the Tea Party direction. On the left, they want to go toward Socialism and Communism. People on either side want to make sure the other side has no ability to take the country in their direction.

The main concern for us on the right (and should be for the entire country) are the Supreme Court justices. If Hillary is able to turn the court into a leftist rubber stamp court, then our country is finished. It's likely we will lose our gun rights. It's likely we will be flooded with immigrants that will eventually be allowed to vote securing a single-party country for generations to come. We will be done as a free country.

That's not worth the gamble just to say I voted a third party candidate. There is way too much on the line right now. We have to keep Hillary out of that White House no matter what.

 

[ChrisL]

This kind of BS needs to end. People who spread this kind of rhetoric are at least partly responsible for the monopoly the two party system has on our government.

So what are you going to do, create a law that states you can't vote for the purpose of keeping a contender out?

If the political views on both sides were closer, there may be room for a third candidate. But our country is drifting further and further apart in political ideology. On the right, people want to go further right into the Tea Party direction. On the left, they want to go toward Socialism and Communism. People on either side want to make sure the other side has no ability to take the country in their direction.

The main concern for us on the right (and should be for the entire country) are the Supreme Court justices. If Hillary is able to turn the court into a leftist rubber stamp court, then our country is finished. It's likely we will lose our gun rights. It's likely we will be flooded with immigrants that will eventually be allowed to vote securing a single-party country for generations to come. We will be done as a free country.

That's not worth the gamble just to say I voted a third party candidate. There is way too much on the line right now. We have to keep Hillary out of that White House no matter what.

This is what happens when you allow a two party system to control the government. You are getting what you voted for.

 

[Cecilie1200]

Hillary is so corrupt she can't be trusted to run my household budget let alone the country.
Trump is only in it for his own entertainment & possibly his wallet.

Where do I go? Third party is a dead end. Do I just pack my bags & go home so to speak? Cross my fingers & hope our economy survives the next 4 years?

I truly have no idea where to focus my attention. Up to this point I have focused on anti Trump shit in a desperate attempt to see a change at our convention to see help for the down ballets but I'm beginning to see that is a lost cause too. Plus it's making me hated here by both sides rather than just one.

Sucks to be in this jar of sour pickles

You have to look at the most important thing that will come from this election, that will affect the country long after the next president is a footnote in history. Who do you want to make the next 2-4 supreme court nominations? The list Trump put together contain some damned fine people, or would you prefer more Kagan and Sotomayor clones. Who makes the picks will affect the country for possibly a hundred years or more.

If I thought for a second that Trump could be trusted to actually pick off that list, that might matter. Unfortunately, immediately after releasing that list, he backpedaled on it and said, basically, "Or, you know, whoever. It'll be great, that's all you need to know." So really, I'm exactly where I was before his list vis a vis Trump's potential SC picks: whichever person happens to tickle his fancy at that particular moment, could be anyone.

That why we have a senate, isn't it? I know what we'll get with the hildabitch, so at this time, the unknown is better.

Honey, if we could trust the frigging Senate to watch out for our best interests, we wouldn't have Donald effing Trump as a nominee in the first place.

And no, the unknown isn't "better"; it's just unknown. I'm already shaking my head at the number of geniuses in this country who decided that what we REALLY needed right now was to bet our nation's future on Schrodinger's Cat with a bad combover, but I feel no inclination whatsoever to join them, especially since I can actually SEE the guy, and make some pretty informed guesses on whether or not that feline is alive . . . perhaps because I'm not busy being desperate to believe this insane gamble MIGHT turn out okay.

Being a cynic might be depressing, but at least all your surprises are good ones.

 

[Cecilie1200]

This "voting for an alternate party is a wasted vote" thing is a big part of the problem.

No one vote is more important or influential than another, so no vote is wasted.

We'd be far better off if people voted their conscience than just looking for the letter after the name, like obedient little sheep.
.

We'd be far better off if more people had consciences.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

This is what happens when you allow a two party system to control the government. You are getting what you voted for.

It's the voters who are keeping the two-party system. It's not like this is something out of our control.

But you'll never get a consensus of voters to usher in a third party. Just like you'll never get a consensus on gun control, global warming, taxation, oil drilling or anything else. Everybody feels differently about subjects than you or me.

I would love it if everybody thought like me when it comes to politics, but I know that will never be possible. All you can really do is play the cards in your hand, and our hand is a two-party system that will likely never change in our lifetime no matter what we do. So you have to make the best of this two-party system because you'll never convince everybody else to magically abandon the other two parties.

 

[dblack]

This is what happens when you allow a two party system to control the government. You are getting what you voted for.

It's the voters who are keeping the two-party system. It's not like this is something out of our control.

It is built-in to our voting system though. Winner-take-all, plurality voting systems inevitably split voters into two dominant factions. We might be able to replace one of the parties via the ballot box, but we won't change the dynamic until we change the voting system.