Op/Ed
Letter to the editor: There are reasons to vote for third-party candidates
During the first few days of 2024, Coast to Coast radio aired predictions for the year with some of the most reliable psychics available. A woman who is also an excellent researcher, stated that Joe Biden was “even worse than Donald Trump.” Although seemingly a long stretch of the imagination, I have never known for her to be wrong.
On the evening of the same day, listener-supported Alternative Radio interviewed Chris Hedges — probably the most reliable investigator of our time. He courageously puts himself in the middle of conflicts to be sure of the accuracy of his reporting. His primary criticism of Biden was the continued support of Netanyahu’s genocide of indigenous people, along with his ignoring of the gross war crimes of cutting off life-supporting supplies of food, water, electricity, etc. The Oct. 7 deaths in Israel were apparently allowed to happen, rather than shooting down the missiles. Instead of the start of a war, as claimed, it gave a good excuse to intensify the mass murder, which has been going on for many decades.
Besides all that, the premature withdrawal from Afghanistan on Donald Trump’s intended schedule, with no concern about the potential takeover by the Taliban, has resulted in great misery there — especially for women.
Then there is the ongoing outrage of Native American rights. My family’s ancestors invaded this continent in 1620 and 1639 and shortly attempted to extinct the “savages.” That attitude is still way too rampant. The federal government doesn’t hesitate to move tribes off their reservations when valuable resources are found there. The people who have wandered over the continents for millennia are now stopped at the “border” and sent back to the intolerable conditions they fled (due to U.S. foreign policy).
Students of U.S./Mexican war history know that the U.S. stole over 50% of our neighbor’s territory. The so-called border was drawn with no regard for the reservations it cut in two. I don’t consider that the white invaders have any right to do that sort of thing. Biden is in strong support of that policy. Chris Hedges revealed a host of other outrages.
It is way past time for a woman of color in office to address this situation. If we had runoff voting, like more democratic countries, we might have elected Green Party vice-presidential candidate Winona LaDuke in 1996 and/or 2000. Her Ojibwe background, with their time-honored wisdom, has led her down a long path of advocating for native rights and much more needed change. The indigenous people stewarded this planet for many thousands of years, generally leaving it better than they found it. In very few centuries the European invaders have all but made it uninhabitable. It seems like we have a lot to learn from them.
One might think (or perhaps dream) that Kamala Harris, with her indigenous Jamaican blood, would educate us about some southwestern history and the ridiculous “border” issue. My great respect for the Jamaicans’ culture and many other admirable qualities clearly isn’t shared by her. After a good deal of investigation into her record, I find many black marks. She is too much of a carbon copy of Biden.
That said, however, I find her humor, laugh and personality refreshing. Her meltdown of the Supreme Macho Bully during the debate was admirable, even though it was largely caused by the long Trump family adherence to intense misogyny and other prejudice. Her pulling Tim Walz out of relative obscurity gives me hope for the future.
However, I’ll carry on my belief in true democracy and vote for another “spoiler.” If enough people would do the same, it would engender a movement to make rank choice, or other runoff voting the norm. Then we could correctly refer to our system as a democracy.
Joe Gleason
Bridport
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