Shorter Gail Collins: Accept That Democracy Is a Myth, and Choose Between Joe Biden and Donald Trump.

 Gail Collins has taken notice that a majority of voters don't want to see a Biden v Trump rematch, and she's put pen to paper. Let's break this down, shall we? 

The presidential race sure does seem like it’ll wind up coming down to Biden vs. Trump — and a whole lot of people would rather have an alternative.

Here’s an important early message: Even if you aren’t thrilled by the Republican and Democratic options come Election Day, don’t vote for anybody else.

Well we're two paragraphs in and already the readers are being told to ignore democracy... 

We’re talking here about the attraction of third parties. So tempting. So disaster-inducing.

Oh; OH. Whoa, for a minute there, I thought you were saying that people can only vote for Biden or Trump. Sounds more like, "just vote for the Democrat of Republican. Gotcha... 

The lure is obvious. Donald Trump’s terrible and Joe Biden’s boring. Much more satisfying to go to the polls and announce you’re too far above the status quo to vote for either.

The way so many people did in 2016, when Trump won the presidency thanks to the Electoral College votes of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. Which Hillary Clinton would probably have carried if the folks who were appalled by Trump had voted for her instead of the Libertarian or Green Party candidates.

Why do people like Collins keep insisting that Libertarian Party voters would have voted for Clinton? What did Clinton do during her campaign to attract libertarians? She's Pro-war and an interventionist, which are non-starters for most libertarians. But the Libertarian Myth has to be in place because it's hard to argue that Clinton would win Pennsylvania otherwise. As for Michigan and Wisconsin, Green Party votes would have helped Clinton, but Libertarian Party votes would (again) most likely gone to Trump, making the point moot. And two things about the Electoral College: (1) she doesn't blame the flawed system for the results, just the people participating in it; and (2) notice that Collins doesn't mention that Clinton won the popular vote (see: Flawed System). Yes. Despite her many flaws, the majority of voters preferred Clinton; it was our system of voting that gave Trump the White House, not third parties...  

OK, ticked-off swing staters, how did that work for you in the long run?

Yes; let's please keep our focus on swing states because looking at states like Hawaii, Oregon, Vermont, Kansas, California and Maine (where Stein received her highest percentages yet it didn't affect the outcome) would make it look like Collins is conflating voter turnout with the eclection process...  

This brings us to No Labels, a new group that’s warning it might launch a third-party candidacy if it isn’t happy with the two major party nominees.

“We care about this country more than the demands of any political party,” No Labels announces on its website. Its founding chairman, Joe Lieberman, told interviewers that his group believes the American people “are so dissatisfied with the choice of Presidents Trump or Biden that they want a third alternative.”

Yeah. But let’s stop here to recall that Lieberman is a former U.S. senator, Democrat of Connecticut. Who ran for vice president with Al Gore on the Democratic ticket in 2000, hurt Gore’s chances with a terrible performance in a debate with Dick Cheney, then made a totally disastrous attempt to run for president himself four years later.

The biggest problem with Lieberman on the ticket was that Al Gore picked him. And if Collins thinks that the 2000 Vice Presidential Debate was the catalyst for Gore losing (like Clinton, he won the popular vote), then someone has been reading Karl Rove's History of America...  

Hard to think of him as a guy with big answers. And about that business of voters wanting a third choice: A lot of them do, until it turns out that option throws the race to the worse of the top two.

Remember all the chaos in the 2000 Florida vote count? The entire presidential election hinged on the result. In the end, Ralph Nader, the Green Party nominee, got more than 97,000 votes there. In a state that George W. Bush eventually won by 537.

Again, going after voters instead of the system. And ignoring that Fox News called Florida, and the rest of the media fell in line. And the Supreme Court cited Bush's credibility (not the "Office of the President") as being at stake. And that more "self-described liberals" voted for Bush than Nader...  

Now Nader had a phenomenal career as a champion of consumer protection and the environment. But this was a terrible finale. His candidacy gave Floridians who felt that Gore was not very exciting a chance to declare their disaffection. It gave them a chance to feel superior. It gave the country a new President Bush. And a war in Iraq.

Points of Clarification: Ralph Nader gave Floridians an option; the American media and Congress (including then-Senator Joe Biden) gave the country a war in Iraq...  

I talked with Nader about his role much later, and he basically said the outcome was Gore’s fault for being a bad candidate. This conversation took place when the country was bearing down on the 2016 election, and Nader vowed not to vote for either Trump or Clinton. “They’re not alike,” he acknowledged, but added, “they’re both terrible.”

Think that was the last time I ever consulted Ralph Nader.

I actually agree that Nader got it wrong: Clinton and Trump are alike and are terrible...  

The third-party thingy also comes up in legislative races. Remember the 2018 Senate contest in Arizona? No? OK, that’s fair. The Democratic candidate was Kyrsten Sinema, who seemed to be in danger of losing because the Green Party was on the ballot, capable of siphoning off a chunk of her supporters. Even though Sinema had a good environmental record! Well, a few days before the election the Green candidate — have I mentioned her name was Angela Green? — urged her supporters to vote for Sinema. Who did squeak out a win.

As senator, Sinema became an, um, unreliable Democratic vote. Who you might call either principled or egocentrically uncooperative. In any case, it didn’t look like she’d have much chance of being renominated. So now she’s very likely to run as … an independent.

Another senator who frequently drives Democratic leaders crazy is Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who hasn’t announced his own plans. But he’s started to flirt with a presidential run. On a No Labels ticket? “I don’t rule myself in and I don’t rule myself out,” he helpfully told an interviewer.

Sigh.

Omitted Fun Facts: Sinema was herself a Green until she decided to go for the money Chuck Schumer somehow convinced her to run as a Democrat. A person who went from complaining about Joe Lieberman (see how things connect?), to voting just like him? Strange. It's almost like some people are opportunists and will latch on to any party for access, cash or power...  

Politicians are perfectly well aware of what effect a third option can have on elections. Back in 2020, a group of Montanans who’d signed petitions to put the Green Party on the ballot discovered that the Republicans had spent $100,000 to support the signature-gathering effort — undoubtedly in hopes that the Green candidate would take votes away from former Democratic governor Steve Bullock when he ran for the Senate. The irate voters went to court and a judge finally ruled that they could remove their names.

Glad Collins brought this up; it's not like Democrats have resorted to such shenanigans to win elections...oh, wait...  

Didn’t help Bullock win, but it does leave another message about the way too many options can be used to screw up an election. Really, people, when it comes time to go to the polls, the smartest thing you can do is accept the depressing compromises that can come with a two-party democracy. Then straighten your back and fight for change anyhow.

No; the smartest thing you can do is not just pay attention during presidential elections. Now if you're still for the duopoly, keep their feet to the fire and challenge them at every turn lest they get complacent and ignore you for their donors (spoiler: too late). As for the rest, there's third parties, mutual aid, community organizing, protesting, etc...  

Don’t forget to vote! But feel free to go home after and have three or four drinks.

Well before you do that, read up on how the Electoral College works. Hint: it's anti-direct democracy...