[[link removed]]

SERIOUSLY? STEIN? SAWANT? SUICIDE?  
[[link removed]]


 

Michael Albert
October 15, 2024
ZNet
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ There are enough people who hate Trump but may vote for Stein or
West or some other third candidate or not vote at all to perhaps move
some swing states into Trump’s column. That could matter greatly. _

, Image by BBC News

 

What should people who hate Trump and Trumpism, fascism and genocide,
misogyny, racism, capitalism and ecological suicide do in the upcoming
U.S. election? Of course that isn’t the only question people in the
United States face. For example, you might also ask how do I best work
to win a U.S. arms embargo on Israel to end the horrendous
U.S.-Israeli perpetrated genocidal carnage against Palestinians? How
do I survive raging flood waters? How do I feed my family and myself?
How do I get an abortion? How do I combat the justice system’s
injustice? How do I tell truth from lies and vice versa? How do I win
some damn dignity? And so on. But what to do on November 5th is
certainly another question, and it’s a big one, and it’s imminent,
and it bears heavily on all the rest.  

One answer for November 5th appears to be: abstain or vote for Stein
or West or some other third party candidate in swing states in order
to defeat Harris there and hopefully to defeat her in the national
election. I am not saying this is what lots of people are
intentionally seeking. But I am saying it is what some people are
intentionally seeking. Including some people who are long time
socialists. Long time anti racists. Long time anti sexists. And
committed, hard working, courageous activists. I will get to a case in
point of just such a person in a minute. But first, why does it
matter?

For a single person to hate Trump but not vote for Harris in Arizona,
Michigan, or Pennsylvania, etc., is manageable. But what about lots of
people? Based on anecdotal evidence and polls, it seems to me that
there are enough people who hate Trump but may vote for Stein or West
or some other third candidate or not vote at all to perhaps move some
swing states into Trump’s column. And I fear that would matter
greatly.

Are you one of those folks? Do you hate Trump? I do too. Are you
frustrated to the gills by current events? Most are. Me too. Do you
want real change? I do too. And do you so viscerally and cerebrally
hate Harris backing Biden backing Israel wage and spread such vile
genocidal policies as starving to death, dehydrating to death, and
literally burning to death Palestinians as to bring to mind Nazi
crimes? I do too. Of course. But if you next think, okay, I will vote
for Stein, West, or whoever, or just not vote on November 5th in my
swing state, then we disagree. And it isn’t just because I am in a
safely blue state.

Do you hope that unlike in the 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, and 2020
elections, this time to vote for the Green Party (or PSL or whatever)
will yield a massive boost to anti imperialist, anti-racist, feminist,
anti-authoritarian, anti-capitalist and Green politics? And that it
won’t instead alienate away potential third party supporters and
movement builders? Do you want to have not voted for anyone who alibis
and abets genocide? Do you want to have not rewarded such heinous,
despicable behavior? Do you worry that it would sell out your true
beliefs to vote Harris even to stop Trump? Do you not want to even be
thought to have done that?

Even if you do understandably feel all of the above, nonetheless and
as emotionally hard as it may be to do, I think one more consideration
should enter your/our election thinking. Whatever anger, pain, fear,
or strategic hope may cause you to lean toward a vote for Stein, West,
or whoever else or to not vote at all in swing states, those choices
will undeniably help Trump. Only Trump or Harris will win. Yes, Harris
could act in ways to make it easier for Trump-haters to vote for her.
And yes, she would be very, very far from a president that you or I
would ideally want. But nonetheless, to defeat Harris is to help elect
Trump. And to elect Trump would seriously and perhaps even
irredeemably hurt every progressive program and prospect that anyone
seeks, here and everywhere. When Trump says the real enemy is the
enemy within, the “radical left lunatics” who may need to be dealt
with by the national guard or the military, he is talking about us.
Drill baby drill. Enrich the rich. Abort abortion. Crush all enemies.
Get it over with, already. These are not manipulative slogans for him.
They are a carefully planned program. Wake up to that on Nov 6th and
declare strategic victory? Seriously?

I wonder, do Stein and other third candidates not understand such a
trivially simple observation? Are they so ignorant, so unable to
reason, that that observation eludes them? I do not think so. But if
not that, then do Stein and other candidates and their advocates
instead think that getting people to vote for them and not for Harris
in swing states is some kind of radical blow for a better future,
thereby offsetting the fact that it undeniably helps Trump? Or perhaps
they think the act of voting for Harris to stop Trump will inexorably
cause such voters to become politically passive and it would be better
to have Trump in full power violently working overtime to compel their
passivity. I have not been able to personally chat with any of them to
ask. I have also not been able to convey nearly as effectively or as
widely as I would like the obvious truth that to oppose genocide, to
be caring, to be radical, to be revolutionary, and to vote your
conscience (where your conscience is cognizant), all entail voting to
stop Trump. And I have not been able to ask Stein, West, or other
third candidates how and why they disagree with those efforts. How
come?

Stein has said
[[link removed]],
we are in “a very dire situation that will be continued under both
Democrats and Republicans. So we say there is no lesser evil in this
race.” So I suppose that is her answer. How comes it that she so
outrageously denies reality. Is she blinded by the light of her 1
percent campaign? Is she blinded by the lure of the press coverage she
gets when she says such things? I don’t know. But now we have
another, and I think a more honest, albeit no less disturbing answer
to why from an exemplary activist who is arguably Stein’s most savvy
and accomplished supporter. 

You may remember Kshama Sawant, Seattle’s socialist city council
member from 2010 to 2024. I won’t review her history. It suffices to
say she has been a singularly successful left candidate and has been
on the progressive, radical, and revolutionary side of issue after
issue. She has been courageous, brilliant, and committed. One need not
have liked her every move or her every allegiance to feel that she has
been exemplary in numerous ways. 

But according to news reports Sawant recently went from Seattle to
Michigan to campaign for and with Jill Stein at a Stein Rally in
Dearborn. Sawant is highly knowledgeable. She is no one’s fool. She
did not say vote for Stein to express your conscience. She did not say
vote for Stein to show you are radical. She did not say vote for Stein
to build the Green Party. No. Sawant said
[[link removed]],
“We need to be clear about what our goals are… We are not in a
position to win the White House. But we do have a real opportunity to
win something historic. We could deny Kamala Harris the state of
Michigan. And the polls show that most likely Harris cannot win the
election without Michigan.” And in case that didn’t express her
intent clearly enough, she added we are “fighting to defeat Harris,
not just symbolically but in reality.” Michigan “is ground zero
to punish Kamala Harris and defeat her…. We need to break the
two-party system, and we need to begin that by breaking this election
for the Democrats in Michigan.” Back in June, Trump made his oddly
similar feelings about Stein known. “I like her also, Jill Stein, I
like her very much.,,, You know why? She takes 100% from them.” I
guess Trump could now say the same about Sawant.

Okay, I admit that I can’t imagine that Sawant will read this essay,
or that Stein will, but maybe some people will who are understandably
feeling that if they vote for Harris in Michigan, or in any swing
state, it would seem to say genocide is okay. The system is okay. The
Democrats are my champions. Or it would deny their own personal past.
Or it would seem to accept a supine future. And so, they
understandably hesitate.  

I have been trying to hear, empathize with, and take those types of
fears and concerns to heart, not least because I share many of them.
And I of course know that Arab Americans and Palestinian Americas have
tragically lost family members. I likewise know that American
progressives and radicals are rightly and righteously furious at
American complicity. But Sawant is being honest. Can you hear her? Is
her intent your intent too? If so, then I guess yes, you should vote
for Stein and on election night if Harris wins and you are happy about
it, or if Trump wins and you are despondent or worse about it, I guess
then, perhaps you might want to reconsider the path you chose.

Let me try another route to the same point. You may think that to vote
for Harris to stop Trump on Nov 5th will cause people to not seek
change for the next four years. But why would you think that? Is that
true for you? How about for me or for Bill Fletcher or Norman Solomon?
How about for Noam Chomsky? For many months I have over and over and
in many different ways urged voting for Harris in swing states to stop
Trump. Does that mean I will become neoliberal? Does it even mean I
feel an iota of pressure or allure to do so? Why do some think it
does? 

I say that instead of what strikes me as a strange and even degrading
belief that radical and even revolutionary commitment is that tenuous,
what would actually seriously hurt activism for the next four years
and maybe for way, way longer, is if Trump wins. With Trump in office,
beholden to a surging supportive MAGA movement, our opposition will
have to fight to prevent negative change—and even fascism. With
Harris in office, our opposition will be able to fight for positive
change, including to win conditions suited to win still further gains
in the future. If you think that is wrong, why do you think it is
wrong?

I am also curious, what does Stein herself do or others who might vote
for her do, between elections (even just to grow a third party) that
she couldn’t do if in swing states she now told her supporters to
vote for Harris to stop Trump? For that matter, I think that for her
to urge supporters to vote for her in safe states but to vote for
Harris in swing states would add more safe Green votes this Election
Day than her campaigning to take away Harris votes in swing states
would subtract. And it would alienate no one. And it would not aid
Trump. So, again, how is that wrong? 

If like Stein you say there is no lesser evil, then yes, I am wrong:
for you to vote for her would be consistent, despite the claim being
utterly ludicrous. If you go a step further to realize and favor the
true dynamic at play, like Sawant does, so you recognize that the
reason to campaign for Stein in swing states is to try to defeat
Harris, then again I am wrong: for you to campaign for and vote for
Stein in swing states would be consistent, albeit, I am sorry to say,
not simply erroneous or ignorant or manipulated, but overtly
grotesque.

Alternatively, even if you are now leaning away from voting for
Harris, there is still time to recognize that to be radical doesn’t
mean to wave a banner saying imperialism sucks even when everyone who
will see your banner already knows its message. What is instead
radical is to act within the bounds of the possible, to act in context
of what is actual, and to act in light of empathy for and solidarity
with those who suffer current injustices and also the injustices that
this election may add, as well as in light of our own suffering, and
most of all in light of the consequences of our choices. In other
words, this November 5th, being radical means voting with our
conscience, yes, but with our consciences clearly accounting for
actual, probable, and predictable real-world consequences.

My assessment that Sawant’s call to defeat Harris is “grotesque”
may sound overly harsh, not least after saying Sawant has been a
singularly successful left candidate and on the progressive, radical,
and revolutionary side of issue after issue, but honestly, to me it
seems rather timid and indeed so gentle that I fear it may seem to
border on paternalism. So here is the straight up truth. I think that
what Sawant is doing, what Stein is doing, and what West and others
are doing in not urging those who appreciate them to vote for Harris
in swing states to stop Trump is either incredibly dumb—which, I
don’t think these three people are—or is incredibly self-serving,
as in seeking publicity for oneself or for one’s pet project
regardless of implications for others—or is incredibly delusional as
in favoring some sort of sincerely heartfelt but stupendously
ill-conceived strategy.

And to those who respond to this election in a swing state by voting
for Stein, West, or whoever else, or for no one but not for
Harris—where all these choices will help Trump as Sawant so clearly
acknowledges and even celebrates—well, I absolutely understand your
pain, your frustration, your wanting to scream and fight and not
reward Harris, but the idea that you are being radical or
revolutionary or even most effectively caring about and addressing
injustice by objectively aiding Trump is, honestly, simply, not what
is happening. 

Although it will no doubt infuriate some, I admit that I think this
entreaty is sort of like the fact that I understand and empathize with
the pain, frustration, and wanting to scream and fight of Trump voters
but I nonetheless decry their choice—in that I also understand and
empathize with the pain, frustration, and wanting to scream of Sawant,
Stein, and other non-Harris advocates and voters, but nonetheless
decry their choice. 

Finally, my entreaty isn’t only about the choice of candidates and
voters. I also wonder why any U.S. leftist who writes, or who could
write, or who publishes or could publish, doesn’t prioritize to
address and reverse this particular imminent trend even while also
addressing the U.S.-Israeli war, ecological suicide, Ukraine,
inequality, racism, misogyny and whatever other injustices and needs
you tend to focus on. And yes, trying to compel Harris to enforce laws
by at the very least refusing to send military materials to Israel is
essential. But the fight to stop Trump also ought to be all hands on
deck. He is no ordinary lesser evil. Trump in office will make all
worthy pursuits including especially Palestinian liberation,
ecological sanity, and development of movements for a new world much,
much harder. The situation is that serious.

_Michael Albert`s radicalization occurred during the 1960s. His
political involvements, starting then and continuing to the present,
have ranged from local, regional, and national organizing projects and
campaigns to co-founding South End Press, Z Magazine, the Z Media
Institute, and ZNet, and to working on all these projects, writing for
various publications and publishers, giving public talks, etc._ 

* 2024 Elections
[[link removed]]
* voting
[[link removed]]
* Third Parties
[[link removed]]
* Vote abstention
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web
[[link removed]]

Submit via email
Frequently asked questions
[[link removed]]
Manage subscription
[[link removed]]
Visit xxxxxx.org
[[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]