Who says there are only 2 options? That is lie. Sure, you’ll get the “you’re throwing away your vote” crowd getting mad at you. But voting for either of the “two parties” ensures that we perpetuate the failed system that we’ve had that gave birth to disastrous presidencies, and the invasive gestapo, anti-Catholic government we have today. The problem with U.S. government is not the D or R occupant per se. It is systemic. We embolden collusion among the “two parties” by accepting the idea that it has to be either one or the other guy. The D & R false dichotomy should be destroyed. Assuming that our votes actually count…
But while this is a perfectly valid strategy - to use your vote to try to cause wider change - it is also a perfectly valid use of your vote to try to avoid an immediate danger. The question of which one is more important is not, I think, a question whose answer is independent of circumstances.
In general, I respect both options. To try to send a message to the politicians who choose to run that if they want your vote, they’ll have to be decent candidates is a good thing. But it will not effect the election that is happening now, and any real effect that it does have may be slow. The likelihood of a third party getting the presidency any time soon is extremely low, but it is possible that the two major parties now might notice that there is an appreciable group of people not voting for either party and modify their candidates/platforms to include some of the things that the most successful third party candidate stands for to try to appeal to these voters. Great.
However, in so doing it is also reasonably likely that we’ll get, for example, stuck with Obama for another four years. And Obama has proven to be on the wrong side of abortion, religious freedom, and probably gay marriage now (all essential issues), and not only to be on the wrong side of the first two in principle but to be aggressively working on behalf of that wrong side.
Whereas Romney, while I have to say I don’t particularly like him as a candidate, is more or less okish on all these issue.
So the question becomes: is the possibility of changing future candidates in small ways (which will hopefully add up to big ways over long enough time) or the possibility of avoiding another four years of Obama more important?
It is my view that in this particular election, it is more important to get rid of Obama, and to possibly save the other strategy for when neither candidate represents grave harm.
