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by lutorm 5905 days ago
"Plenty of people knew this, but voted for Obama anyway."

In all fairness, given the range of options offered for American voters, I'd also have gone with Obama even if I didn't agree on everything.

2 comments

This is not how US politcs works. If you agree with a side on some points and disagree with others you are ostracized by all groups. It is stupid, but unfortunately the US is a place where (for example) you are pro-death penalty and anti-abortion or pro-abortion and anti-death penalty. If you are pro both or anti both, almost everyone hates you.
You almost had a point here, but your unfortunate choice of terms demonstrates a lot of what's wrong with US politics. Rather than referring to the pro-choice movement as such, you've adopted a label, pro-abortion, that is simply misleading. Here we have a debate over women's reproductive health rights, and it gets reduced to misleading soundbites like "pro-abortion."

In the same way, I think much of what is being protested in this thread comes from the false dichotomy between "pro-security" and "anti-security" that ignores how important the ideals of personal rights are to the debate. US politics is well-characterized by a practiced reduction of complex political issues to misleading soundbites.

Just goes to highlight why electoral reform is important. When we start talking about more expressive ballots (i.e. expressing more than just a tactical first preference), your options aren't nearly as limited.