Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said in an interview with NBC News that he will encourage progressive voters to still back Democrats on the ticket in November even if moderates are victorious in the primaries.
Since votes are secret, it really just indicates “I voted is this election and are 50/49/1 percent likely to have voted winner/runner-up/either”
I think not voting at all is a stronger message of “I wasn’t encouraged to actually vote for or against either”, but it’s also indistinguishable from “I just don’t care anymore” or “I was in a coma that November”
Have you observed that to be moving the DNC to the left over the past few decades? My observation is that after Kamala received fewer votes than Biden and lost to Trump, in the face of the historic (yet still measly) 4% of the primary vote being for Uncommitted, the entrenched neoliberals are digging in their heels and continuing to oppose progressive primary candidates in 2025 and 2026 primaries. My conclusion is that they don’t care, and we can’t trust them to get any message other than “you’re fired, and being replaced by this progressive candidate.” And the only way to do that is by voting for a progressive primary challenger in the primary.
I see people who don’t vote saying they never receive any flyers, calls, texts, canvassers, or any other kind of outreach from any campaigns. And then I see people who voted in either the primary or the general say they are bombarded with those types of outreach. So it’s hard for me to conclude anything other than that campaigns by and large ignore people with a public record of not voting. Because it’s harder and costs more to get a non-voter to vote than it is to get a voter to vote against the opposition. And in first-past-the-post, that is truly what your vote is in the general. Not a vote for the best, but a vote against the worst who is most likely to win.
“First-past-the-post” is a terrible moniker to describe the sort of single ballot plurality wins elections common in the USA. It’s metaphor is clumsy to the point of inaccuracy, since there isn’t any predermined scale that declares a winner. Whether only 3 votes are cast or 3 million, the winner is whomever has the biggest pile. A better sports metaphor might be “shotput”, but I think “plurality wins” is clear enough.
That being said, that the democratic establishment is ignoring the signals doesn’t mean that they aren’t relatively strong. The party’s voters are moving to the left, so even if the consultant gang isn’t responding to the collective “ew” of Uncommitted someone is.
What I mean is whether the signal is being ignored or misinterpreted is kind of immaterial. The desired result is not being observed, so a different tactic is required. We consistently have more non-voters than primary voters, so why not try voting in the primaries where each vote carries more weight than it does in the general? It certainly can’t be construed as a tacit approval of neoliberal policies like a vote for such a nominee in the general could be. So you still get a more clear and direct message than you did with non-voting.
Since votes are secret, it really just indicates “I voted is this election and are 50/49/1 percent likely to have voted winner/runner-up/either”
I think not voting at all is a stronger message of “I wasn’t encouraged to actually vote for or against either”, but it’s also indistinguishable from “I just don’t care anymore” or “I was in a coma that November”
Have you observed that to be moving the DNC to the left over the past few decades? My observation is that after Kamala received fewer votes than Biden and lost to Trump, in the face of the historic (yet still measly) 4% of the primary vote being for Uncommitted, the entrenched neoliberals are digging in their heels and continuing to oppose progressive primary candidates in 2025 and 2026 primaries. My conclusion is that they don’t care, and we can’t trust them to get any message other than “you’re fired, and being replaced by this progressive candidate.” And the only way to do that is by voting for a progressive primary challenger in the primary.
I see people who don’t vote saying they never receive any flyers, calls, texts, canvassers, or any other kind of outreach from any campaigns. And then I see people who voted in either the primary or the general say they are bombarded with those types of outreach. So it’s hard for me to conclude anything other than that campaigns by and large ignore people with a public record of not voting. Because it’s harder and costs more to get a non-voter to vote than it is to get a voter to vote against the opposition. And in first-past-the-post, that is truly what your vote is in the general. Not a vote for the best, but a vote against the worst who is most likely to win.
“First-past-the-post” is a terrible moniker to describe the sort of single ballot plurality wins elections common in the USA. It’s metaphor is clumsy to the point of inaccuracy, since there isn’t any predermined scale that declares a winner. Whether only 3 votes are cast or 3 million, the winner is whomever has the biggest pile. A better sports metaphor might be “shotput”, but I think “plurality wins” is clear enough.
That being said, that the democratic establishment is ignoring the signals doesn’t mean that they aren’t relatively strong. The party’s voters are moving to the left, so even if the consultant gang isn’t responding to the collective “ew” of Uncommitted someone is.
Yeah, agreed on the wording.
What I mean is whether the signal is being ignored or misinterpreted is kind of immaterial. The desired result is not being observed, so a different tactic is required. We consistently have more non-voters than primary voters, so why not try voting in the primaries where each vote carries more weight than it does in the general? It certainly can’t be construed as a tacit approval of neoliberal policies like a vote for such a nominee in the general could be. So you still get a more clear and direct message than you did with non-voting.