Best Political Cartoons

[RavynousHunter]

Eeh, sometimes, you gotta go with the one that's just less of an asshole than their opponents.  Just how shit is, sometimes.

[Ironchew]

Eeh, sometimes, you gotta go with the one that's just less of an asshole than their opponents.  Just how shit is, sometimes.

I disagree, to the point where I think that's a worse idea than not voting at all. Your options are restricted in a first-past-the-post system, but if enough people vote for a party that represents their interests and one of those parties gains enough momentum, it starts cannibalizing the "mainstream" parties. Said mainstream parties respond by running candidates or supporting policies that are very similar to the upstart party in an attempt to win back votes. At least in the United States, this worked in the 1930s with the Communist party and the Democrats and it could still work today.

Voting for the lesser evil perpetuates shitty politics and it shifts the range of acceptable political opinions further away from you.

[Random Gal]

Sadly, most of the time, third parties in America tend to be election spoilers for the party closest to them, like with Nader throwing the Florida vote to Bush in 2000. Even the most successful third-party run in 1912 accomplished the same thing, dividing the Republicans and landing the Democrats in the White House.

[Ironchew]

Sadly, most of the time, third parties in America tend to be election spoilers for the party closest to them, like with Nader throwing the Florida vote to Bush in 2000. Even the most successful third-party run in 1912 accomplished the same thing, dividing the Republicans and landing the Democrats in the White House.

That's the whole point. You sabotage the campaigns of one mainstream party so that they come crawling to your party's platform in the next election cycle. That's how to shift the range of acceptable political opinions towards your issues.

[RavynousHunter]

Okay, I have a pertinent question for ya, Chew: how?  How do you propose we, realistically, go about doing what you're talking about?  Remember that we're not millionaires, and that the game is critically rigged against us.

[dpareja]

Maybe George Washington was right about political parties....

[Ironchew]

Okay, I have a pertinent question for ya, Chew: how?  How do you propose we, realistically, go about doing what you're talking about?  Remember that we're not millionaires, and that the game is critically rigged against us.

If I started discussing realistic options you would move the goalposts on me. Fuck realistic -- I aim for optimistic.

If we stopped paying attention to the shills telling us not to vote, that would be a start (yes, I know propaganda is tailor-made by top-notch psychologists to be spoon-fed to the masses without trouble) We have to get up off our asses, help the campaigns of candidates we support, and vote for them in the primaries of their parties -- many third parties allow voters affiliated with other parties or none at all to vote in their primaries. Finally, we need to get over the "vote for the lesser evil" bullshit and start voting for the candidate, third party or no, that best supports our issues. When a big enough chunk of the voting population does this, the mainstream parties begin to adopt those platforms because they want those votes back, and the range of acceptable political opinion shifts in our favor.

If this sounds like too much trouble to you, ask yourself, "Is this more trouble than enduring a government that doesn't represent me for the rest of my life?". If your answer is no [EDIT: I meant "yes"], you have nothing to complain about.

[RavynousHunter]

Okay, I have a pertinent question for ya, Chew: how?  How do you propose we, realistically, go about doing what you're talking about?  Remember that we're not millionaires, and that the game is critically rigged against us.

If I started discussing realistic options you would move the goalposts on me.

So, you automatically know what I'm gonna do?  Well, fuck me, with your powers of foresight, you could just about be a god damned superhero.  I meant what I said, you braying jackass, I don't hide landmines in my words unlike some pretentious weenies out there.

[Ghoti]

So, you automatically know what I'm gonna do?  Well, fuck me, with your powers of foresight, you could just about be a god damned superhero.  I meant what I said, you braying jackass, I don't hide landmines in my words unlike some pretentious weenies out there.

You seem upset.

[RavynousHunter]

So, you automatically know what I'm gonna do?  Well, fuck me, with your powers of foresight, you could just about be a god damned superhero.  I meant what I said, you braying jackass, I don't hide landmines in my words unlike some pretentious weenies out there.

You seem upset.

I don't like people putting words in my mouth.  Unless I'm joking, which usually isn't too difficult to tell, I say what I mean.  I don't do goalpost-shifting nonsense; it takes too much time, too much energy, and yields too little reward.

(Also, just because I'm caustic doesn't mean I'm upset.  I just felt like being caustic...like a good organic acid.)

[Ghoti]

So, you automatically know what I'm gonna do?  Well, fuck me, with your powers of foresight, you could just about be a god damned superhero.  I meant what I said, you braying jackass, I don't hide landmines in my words unlike some pretentious weenies out there.

You seem upset.

I don't like people putting words in my mouth.  Unless I'm joking, which usually isn't too difficult to tell, I say what I mean.  I don't do goalpost-shifting nonsense; it takes too much time, too much energy, and yields too little reward.

(Also, just because I'm caustic doesn't mean I'm upset.  I just felt like being caustic...like a good organic acid.)

Ah, that makes sense.

[Random Gal]

Sadly, most of the time, third parties in America tend to be election spoilers for the party closest to them, like with Nader throwing the Florida vote to Bush in 2000. Even the most successful third-party run in 1912 accomplished the same thing, dividing the Republicans and landing the Democrats in the White House.

That's the whole point. You sabotage the campaigns of one mainstream party so that they come crawling to your party's platform in the next election cycle. That's how to shift the range of acceptable political opinions towards your issues.

Except nothing like that happened in the examples I mentioned. Nader didn't force the Democrats to go more liberal in 2004 and Roosevelt didn't force the Republicans to be more progressive in 1916. If anything, the opposite happened.

[Nemo]

Say what you will about the Tea Party (and I have a lot to say about them, not much nice), but give them credit: they had an impact. They forced the Republican Party so far right that I can almost feel myself getting stupider every time my family discusses politics, which thankfully isn't often.

Any progressive counterpart to the Tea Party will not be as well funded as they are The Tea Party is a totally grassroots movement of regular, average, real Americans, and to beat that, any progressive counterpart will need to focus on lower level grassroots moves of their own. Don't expect to intimidate politicians with money. Instead, we would have to focus on education and public awareness. Which brings me to another weakness to be overcome.

It's often been pointed out that the Tea Party movement consists largely of older generations. That works well in their favor for the moment. Older people vote more, and they are more politically active. Other than voter apathy, the worst thing for democracy is the idea that the Wednesday after you vote, your civic responsibility is done. Not so. Hold leaders accountable. Change isn't easy. Voting isn't even the bare minimum that an individual can contribute.

[R. U. Sirius]

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Tea_Party

While I don't doubt that the Tea Party is made up mainly of ordinary people, there are very good reasons to disbelieve its claims to being a "grassroots" movement. Grassroots movements, by and large, start from the bottom and work their way up, often with little or no funding other than what their participants can scrape together. There's strong evidence that the Koch brothers have been pulling the Tea Party's financial strings since the beginning, as shown in the article above, even though they've tried to keep their involvement at enough of a remove to be deniable.

[Feral Dog]