Wrong!

I have heard this statement my whole life and on the surface it sounds logical but if you really think about it, that is a very stupid thing to say.  So, if  Charles Manson is the  Democrat nominee, and Jeffrey Dahmer is the Republican nominee, we are obligated to vote for one of them or we have no right to complain?  Someone please show me where that is written in the Constitution.   In some cases, a non vote is in fact a vote regardless of the outcome.  People will tell you that if you do not vote for one candidate, then you are essentially voting for the other candidate.  While the outcome of the election may be undesirable, the end result is that you by voting for one candidate are directly responsible for them being there.

I reject that you cannot complain if you did not vote for one of the candidates.  My non vote is a vote on principal because either candidate is wrong and on principal, I do not want the blood on my hands.  The two parties will argue that you should vote for the least evil of the candidates because one murderer may be more violent than the other.  They will tell you that you must vote for the guy that has killed less people because fewer murders are better than many murders.  Think about that for a moment.  The two parties have divided people so much that that if you disagree with one candidate, then you are in support of the other candidate.  I was opposed to this voting for the least of the two evils anyway but a couple years ago when I was complaining about Obama, someone started pointing out the negatives of McCain as though I was a McCain supporter.  The assumption was that if I did not support Obama then I must be a McCain supporter when in fact, I did not like either of them.

As I have said many times in the past, when you vote for the perceived lesser of the two evils, you are enabling the two parties to use you in a game.  You are participating in a game the two parties have been playing for years.  The two parties have decided that party power is more important than the country so they will play the people against each other.  The tribal mentality sets in where one side is determined to oust the other.  They will do whatever it takes to prevent the other side from gaining power, even if it is to sell out their own principals.  Being in power becomes the singular goal while the country is destroyed.  When you vote for the lesser of the two evils instead of letting them lose, you are enabling them.  They learn to expect your vote and forget who got them there.

But what if I don’t vote for the lesser of the two evils an the other guy wins?  If people did this in great numbers, then the lesser of the two evils may begin to understand that something is wrong.  If this non vote is coupled with a vocal campaign telling them why no one is voting for them, then they will  understand they do in fact have a constituency they represent.  They may think twice before not representing the people that got them there.   There are some things in life that are absolutely negotiable.  Right is always right, even if no one believes it. Wrong is always wrong, no matter how many people do believe it.  Sometimes you have to make the hard decisions and do something right, regardless of the outcome.  Voting for Charles Manson or Jeffrey Dahmer is wrong.  Sometimes a principal is more important than winning.