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A vote is nothing more than your chance to voice your opinion on who you think is the best to lead of the given choices. Its not a game of pick the winner, if it was, and by your logic, every single person who voted for Hillary wasted their vote, and everyone in hindsight should have just voted for Trump so they could feel like they picked the winner. Its an absurd premise, votes aren't wasted as long as you believe the candidate you picked is the best of the options given.
I surely wish I could agree with you, really, but all facts, history and reason have me concluding the opposite. You are right our right to vote is "not a game," but if you are not trying to pick a winner, you have basically sidelined your vote, or even worse you may be helping promote the agenda you actually support the least. How Nader supporters helped Bush defeat Gore, for example, is a perfect example...
I surely wish I could agree with you, really, but all facts, history and reason have me concluding the opposite. You are right our right to vote is "not a game," but if you are not trying to pick a winner, you have basically sidelined your vote, or even worse you may be helping promote the agenda you actually support the least. How Nader supporters helped Bush defeat Gore, for example, is a perfect example...
Its an opinion of which you are entitled to, but its still not true that its a "wasted vote" sorry.
The only way my vote is wasted is if I'm pressured to use it to vote for a candidate that I don't view as better than one of the other options. I don't care how you arbitrarily value my vote since you are not entitled to any value from my vote. My vote belongs to me, as does its value, when I use it to voice my opinion in our system, I get value from having my voice heard, regardless of what you or 300M other people think.
Right. Seems we certainly have a hard of hearing problem here...
Such comparisons are done all the time, especially if you are a Trump supporter who wants to point at the stock market as some sort of success due to Trump. Hard to compare other than his first six months at this point. Right?
More to the point that me and others have tried to explain to you and others is that the same trend existed during Obama's first six months and all through his 8 years! So although I too am not one to give any POTUS credit for market swings one way or another, what is "pure idiocy" is giving Trump credit for the ongoing upward trend of the markets that started long before he appeared on the scene?
Not sure if you were necessarily doing that, but that's at least in part what I think the OP was getting at and a lot of others looking for any evidence Trump might be good for America. Please don't tell me you can't hear any of that either! Please have mercy...
The problem seems to be one of hard heads, not hard hearing. Who in the first six months had the most all time highs ? That is the measure of real progress. Retracing old territory is less difficult than making new ground.
All three major indexes on Feb. 15 closed at record highs for the fifth consecutive day.
It was the first time the three indexes achieved concurrent high records for that length of time since January 1992, according to analyses reported by CNNMoney and MarketWatch.
The problem seems to be one of hard heads, not hard hearing. Who in the first six months had the most all time highs ? That is the measure of real progress. Retracing old territory is less difficult than making new ground.
All three major indexes on Feb. 15 closed at record highs for the fifth consecutive day.
It was the first time the three indexes achieved concurrent high records for that length of time since January 1992, according to analyses reported by CNNMoney and MarketWatch.
Hard hearing or hard heads or hard for folks to properly connect these dots. Perhaps all the above...
For you to suggest, for example, that "the measure of real progress" is whomever enjoys the most "all time highs" in the first six months is utterly astonishing to me. Here too, so wrong I really don't know where to begin, but maybe at least just one thing to keep in mind..., everything is relative!
Math: you can have a lower "high" going from 8,000 to 9,000 as compared to the high today of 22,000 over 21,000, but going from 8,000 to 9,000 is an increase of 12.5%. Going from 21,000 to 22,000 is an increase of not even 5%. Also need to think in terms of NPV, the value of those dollars back then as compared to the value of dollars today...
You really want to stick with what you view as "the measure of real progress?" If so, at least do the math!
Its an opinion of which you are entitled to, but its still not true that its a "wasted vote" sorry.
The only way my vote is wasted is if I'm pressured to use it to vote for a candidate that I don't view as better than one of the other options. I don't care how you arbitrarily value my vote since you are not entitled to any value from my vote. My vote belongs to me, as does its value, when I use it to voice my opinion in our system, I get value from having my voice heard, regardless of what you or 300M other people think.
I wish I could agree with you, but I just don't, and for what I think are sound reasons supported by all the facts and history that well demonstrate what I believe contrary to what you believe in these respects. Please hear me out...
Obviously, the issue is not one of pressure, since we all know that no one is pressured into doing whatever they want when they enter the voting booth. If by pressure you mean the likes of this consideration contrary to what you believe, I trust that sort of pressure is a good thing. Right? Why vote if not a result of some critical thinking in these respects?
How you or I value our votes is also of little relevance. This is not a personal matter. I know full well you will do exactly as you wish for the reasons you choose. I am in no way forcing anything on anyone. I am simply providing what I think is the sound reason and logic to think about what actually occurs when you choose to vote for other than a candidate with a viable chance of winning.
If you are interested in that reason and logic, then you should simply review the other C-D thread I started sometime back and posted in my prior comment in this thread since the issue has been raised again. All manner of this issue is considered at length in that thread for you to consider or dismiss as I you wish. If not interested, then I guess we just wasted a few more key strokes for nothing, as usual in these threads.
Just two suggestions if I may in any case; 1) try not to take any of this personally. This is simply weighing what works in politics and what doesn't, and 2) if you can give me any good example where a protest vote or enough protest votes have made a negligible difference in our recent voting history, I would like to know what it is. Not a case that makes any one person feel better about their vote, but in terms of the national outcome that ultimately I am sure we can agree is what affects all of us most, no matter how we vote.
I wish I could agree with you, but I just don't, and for what I think are sound reasons supported by all the facts and history that well demonstrate what I believe contrary to what you believe in these respects. Please hear me out...
Obviously, the issue is not one of pressure, since we all know that no one is pressured into doing whatever they want when they enter the voting booth. If by pressure you mean the likes of this consideration contrary to what you believe, I trust that sort of pressure is a good thing. Right? Why vote if not a result of some critical thinking in these respects?
How you or I value our votes is also of little relevance. This is not a personal matter. I know full well you will do exactly as you wish for the reasons you choose. I am in no way forcing anything on anyone. I am simply providing what I think is the sound reason and logic to think about what actually occurs when you choose to vote for other than a candidate with a viable chance of winning.
If you are interested in that reason and logic, then you should simply review the other C-D thread I started sometime back and posted in my prior comment in this thread since the issue has been raised again. All manner of this issue is considered at length in that thread for you to consider or dismiss as I you wish. If not interested, then I guess we just wasted a few more key strokes for nothing, as usual in these threads.
Just two suggestions if I may in any case; 1) try not to take any of this personally. This is simply weighing what works in politics and what doesn't, and 2) if you can give me any good example where a protest vote or enough protest votes have made a negligible difference in our recent voting history, I would like to know what it is. Not a case that makes any one person feel better about their vote, but in terms of the national outcome that ultimately I am sure we can agree is what affects all of us most, no matter how we vote.
Fair?
I don't take it personally, but I still find your to be completely off base. There are no "facts or history" or other threads that change the very simple premise that my vote is my opportunity in our election process to voice my opinion. To say that however I voice my opinion is a "waste" is just factually incorrect nomatter how you slice it. It may not impact the results of the election the way you or others want it to, but that is not my concern, my concern is that I get to voice my opinion, and that my friend is why its not a waste to me.
I don't take it personally, but I still find your to be completely off base. There are no "facts or history" or other threads that change the very simple premise that my vote is my opportunity in our election process to voice my opinion. To say that however I voice my opinion is a "waste" is just factually incorrect nomatter how you slice it. It may not impact the results of the election the way you or others want it to, but that is not my concern, my concern is that I get to voice my opinion, and that my friend is why its not a waste to me.
Right you are! There are no facts or history or other threads that change the very simple fact that your vote is whatever you wish it to be! Was that what you read from my comments??? Believe me, we are in agreement about that fact -- without question!
What I am trying to point out has nothing to do with your right to do and feel as you see fit in those regards!
If on the other hand, you want to consider the practical results of how we vote in the aggregate, again in terms of who actually wins the election and how that affects all of us, then you are understanding what is not in the least bit "off base," but simply how our political process delivers today in this country.
Perhaps an analogy might help...
Say you want to bake a cake. You want to eat a cake. Even more like the issue at hand here, say you must bake a cake whether you want to or not. Fact is, you will ultimately have a cake based on what you have available in your kitchen in the way of ingredients, or what your neighbors will bake for you.
What you actually want is a pie, not a cake! But you have no way to make a pie, and either do your neighbors! All you and your neighbors have at their disposal is the makings of a Strawberry cake or a Blueberry cake.
You HATE both, but you can make one or the other, and truth be told, you prefer Strawberry a wee bit more than Blueberry...
Accordingly, only makes sense you bake a Strawberry cake for yourself. Or you can simply mix up what amounts to no cake whatsoever and end up with the cake your neighbors give you!
Don't know about you, but I think any thinking person who wants results they prefer, not bragging rights about baking something no one gets to eat, is going to CHOOSE/vote for the practical outcome they prefer, not "waste" their time in the kitchen toward something that never sees the light of day!
•The Dow Jones industrial average rose above 22,000 for the first time Wednesday.
•Boeing, McDonald's and UnitedHealth helped the index get here from 21,000.
•Wall Street believes Home Depot, Pfizer and Cisco Systems will likely lead the Dow to 23,000, according to CNBC analysis of FactSet data.
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