this post was submitted on 22 Oct 2024
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United States | News & Politics

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A new poll suggests that Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein is drawing more voters from former President Donald Trump than from Vice President Kamala Harris.

According to a Noble Predictive Insights survey released last week, Harris holds a narrow lead over Trump in a hypothetical three-way race. With Stein on the ballot, Harris' lead expands, pointing to a potential spoiler effect similar to what many Democrats blamed Stein for doing to Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election.

For Trump, the emergence of Stein as a potential spoiler may be a critical factor in battleground states, where even a small shift in votes could determine the outcome. For Harris, Stein's candidacy could paradoxically provide an unexpected advantage, drawing votes from Trump and narrowing his pathway to victory.

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[–] bigkahuna1986@lemmy.ml 60 points 3 weeks ago

I won't believe a single poll until this election is over. There is so much incentive for misinformation out there it is unbearable. Just get out and vote.

[–] Alsephina@lemmy.ml 39 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Libs will still blame leftists like blue maga wants them to.

[–] p03locke@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (3 children)

This is a sentence with words, but the arrangement makes no sense. You sure you didn't generate that from ChatGPT?

[–] GarbageShootAlt2@lemmy.ml 20 points 3 weeks ago

I think it's funny that someone with "Locke" in their name would seemingly not distinguish between liberals and leftists.

[–] Alsephina@lemmy.ml 19 points 3 weeks ago

? Do you disagree? Isn't blaming leftists what blue maga is currently priming their voters for if/when they lose?

[–] Arelin@lemmy.zip 13 points 3 weeks ago

This is a sentence with words, but the arrangement makes no sense. You sure you didn’t generate that from ChatGPT?

[–] DoubleChad@lemmy.ml 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (3 children)

Alright I'll bite. I don't understand this. The word liberal has two meanings: the classical and the colloquial. The latter is indistinguishable from leftist, so I assume you are using the classical form.

Classical liberals will still blame leftists, like ... blue maga wants them to? Who exactly is blue maga? Jill Stein supporters?

Classical liberals also span the left-right spectrum right now, with many identifying as libertarian. I struggle to see what you are getting at regardless of who blue maga represents, but maybe there is a good point here.

[–] GarbageShootAlt2@lemmy.ml 12 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Words can have different colloquial meanings. There is a really crass meaning of liberal that would identify Marx as a liberal, yes, and this is the most popular one in America, but there's another colloquial meaning (more popular in other anglophone countries, but gaining traction in America) where liberals are basically centrists (in capitalist societies) who might pretend to be progressive but are ultimately moderates to their bones. This came from the proclivities of "Liberal" parties, along with centrists understandably claiming the name of whatever the ruling ideology is, and here it is of course liberalism.

Among leftist circles, "liberal" is sort of an unmarked term for the moderate definition and the Lockean definition both, like how "guys" can refer to both a group of males and a group of mixed gender, despite "gals" only referring specifically to a group of females (I'm using those terms because they apply to children also, not just men/women).

So the comment is saying, in translation: "Democrat aligned people will still blame socialists (etc.) like their Democrat ideological cult wants them to." Does that make sense?

[–] DoubleChad@lemmy.ml 2 points 3 weeks ago

Yeah, very helpful, thank you.

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[–] orcrist@lemm.ee 28 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Do you think all of those people who have been saying that third-party voters are going to destroy the US will be apologizing in the comment section here?

[–] Flocklesscrow@lemm.ee 13 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

First past the post is a terrible design. Let's rank choice and move on.

lol, pie in the sky right?

[–] OurToothbrush@lemmy.ml 2 points 3 weeks ago

It is literally more likely for a socialist revolution to happen in the US than for us to use STV enough to choose the president that way.

[–] UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml 1 points 3 weeks ago

But democrats believe in democracy!

[–] Spacehooks@reddthat.com 2 points 3 weeks ago

Sure i'll start. If this is true, I was wrong. I couldn't believe a republican to not fall in line with the party even if the put a party clown up. Good job proving me wrong and saving America.

[–] josie@vegantheoryclub.org 22 points 3 weeks ago

Dem mental gymnastics are going into overdrive rn

[–] GissaMittJobb@lemmy.ml 19 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

I'm struggling really hard to see which voter is on the fence between Trump and Stein. Wouldn't it be more likely to be on the fence between Stein and Harris, or Stein and the couch?

[–] maniacalmanicmania@aussie.zone 20 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

I think Trump draws a lot of broad support from his 'anti-establishment' rhetoric so it kinda makes sense for folks to look to other anti-establishment candidates as an alternative to him. There's a tendency to look down upon Trump voters as only right wingers, conspiracists etc and not really understand that a lot of his support is superficial and based on limited information.

In a way it's not so much that Stein or other left candidates are spoilers for the establishment Dems but more the case that figures like Trump are spoilers for progressive alternatives to the establishment.

[–] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 19 points 3 weeks ago

Jill Stein is providing spite voters an option to not vote for Donald Trump.

Hillary took a lot of friendly fire in 2016 from the Bernie Bros who were not too happy.

[–] GarbageShootAlt2@lemmy.ml 13 points 3 weeks ago

Not as many people hate Harris specifically as hated Hillary, but a lot of people (for good and bad reasons) hate the Dems and also Kamala to some extent.

[–] octopus_ink@lemmy.ml 13 points 3 weeks ago

Jill Stein releases a statement: "To be clear, I only want Kamala votes please! Only former Kamala voters!"

[–] ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml 13 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

You heard'em, start campaigning for Stein if you want Kamala to win.

[–] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 7 points 3 weeks ago

A vote for Stein is a vote for Kamala!

[–] GammaGames 9 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

What about four-way race? Some states still have RFK on the ballot 🥴

[–] BlueLineBae@midwest.social 5 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

In Illinois, we had RFK and no Jilly-bean.

[–] JillyB 4 points 3 weeks ago

Yep. Thought that was weird since he dropped out.

[–] tetris11@lemmy.ml 8 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

Always make both parties worried: threaten to vote for a third party to keep the main party on its toes. But vote for the main party on the actual day. This isn't a time for idealism.

[–] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 16 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)
[–] superglue@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I've also seen people vote third party for just as long and not a damn thing has changed either. In fact I used to be one of them.

[–] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 7 points 3 weeks ago

Has it not? Political parties have copied popular policies from third parties in their subsequent elections many times.

But only once they see how many votes they lose on it they will start considering those policies.

[–] tetris11@lemmy.ml 3 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Sure, if you're willing to take your actions to the streets and have a large following behind you, then by all means strike while the fire is hot.

But if you're not organised other than a vague internet presence, now is really not the time to fuck about.

[–] basmati@lemmus.org 7 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Oh, you mean materially supporting protests, showing up to several daily for months, and marching in the street as often as possible? Glad to hear you support Jill Stein.

[–] tetris11@lemmy.ml 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

MLK commanded 44% popularity, Jill Stein is nowhere in that league.

To compare the marches and the impact of the two is the definition of insanity, and to ask others to lend support for her or any 3rd party now at such a critical time is literal madness.

[–] basmati@lemmus.org 4 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Who in the fuck brought up MLK?

[–] tetris11@lemmy.ml 2 points 3 weeks ago

(a few comments up)

[–] GarbageShootAlt2@lemmy.ml 9 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

A threat that you refuse to make good on is the same as doing nothing. I have no interest in telling someone who to vote for, but your proposed strategy is ridiculous.

[–] tetris11@lemmy.ml 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

Right? If we have nukes, we should just use them! The threat itself does nothing....

(...think before you speak)

[–] GarbageShootAlt2@lemmy.ml 5 points 3 weeks ago

Appropriately apocalyptic for the liberal view on these elections, but the problem, also appropriate for the liberal view on these elections, is that you are taking the Other to be a complete dipshit.

If you're in a situation that isn't the literal end of the world, bluffing has a serious danger associated with it because it informs all circumstances subsequent to the bluff if it gets called. From that point on, people know that your threats are not to be taken seriously, and you have robbed yourself of whatever power you had. You become a "boy who cried wolf" with respect to the actions you will take.

Furthermore, this time in all situations, it's somewhere between difficult and impossible to stake such a widespread plan of action on everyone at all times maintaining a lie. How do you agitate for such a thing? You can't speak of it in the open. How do you vet candidates? Someone might be an asset (and liberals usually believe spaces both online and offline are crawling with assets for other states) or even just someone who thinks you plan is bullshit and will decide to talk about it afterwards. Basically, your plan works in the same realm of imagination where wars would stop if all of the soldiers on both sides just laid down their arms. That is to say, if you could just cast a spell and make people act that way, sure, but that's not how politics works.

Lastly, it's important to remember we are talking about threats, so "If we have nukes, we should just use them!" is a complete non sequitur. That's not a threat, that's just an attack. Incidentally, while there is a good argument to be made that if you get nuked, you should just take the L if you think your barrage might tip the scales into the world ending, such an idea definitionally does not work as the dominant ideology because at that point MAD does not protect your country anymore and there's really no point in you having nukes when you're just surrendering to death anyway. If you're an individual operator of a nuclear silo or something and you refuse to participate in ending the world, good for you, but again that's something that you can't organize with because it's a conspiracy of a similar style to what I outlined before, so you aren't going to succeed in helping very much unless you're on the vanguard and it might be a false positive that an enemy nuke was launched at all (this happened at least once with the USSR, during the Cuban Missile Crisis). In that extremely specific situation where mass action is impossible and only a tiny fraction of a fraction of the population ever gets close to being in the conditions where such an incident has even a slim possibility of occuring: Yes, there it works well.

[–] UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml 1 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

I'm interested in your timeline for idealism. Got time to share it with us?

[–] tetris11@lemmy.ml 1 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

2 minutes before a two-horse election apparently is a fantastic time for it

tips hat, backs out of the room

[–] LoamImprovement 6 points 3 weeks ago

I don't listen to polls anymore. I've already voted, I don't give a fuck about who's leading who.

[–] beefbot@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 3 weeks ago

BUT STILL DONT FUCKIN VOTE FOR HER THO

I’m talking to you, dipshit dev I worked w 4y ago who sounded stupid then too

[–] KingThrillgore@lemmy.ml 3 points 3 weeks ago
[–] averyminya 3 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

This week, Stein received an endorsement from David Duke, the former Ku Klux Klan leader. Duke, a known white supremacist, endorsed Stein over Trump, citing her criticism of U.S. policy on Israel as the reason. Stein has unequivocally rejected the endorsement, calling Duke a "racist troll" in a social media post. Nevertheless, the attention surrounding the endorsement has cast a shadow over Stein's campaign and added a controversial layer to an already-complex race.

I hate when you're on my side!

[–] i_ben_fine@lemmy.one 7 points 3 weeks ago

It's correct to oppose Israel. Obviously David Duke just opposes anything associated with Jews, though.