In two recent columns, Charles M. Blow described Mitt Romney’s relationship to the truth. In the first, he said: "This election may go down in history as the moment when truth and lies lost their honor and stigma, respectively. Mitt Romney has demonstrated an uncanny, unflinching willingness to say anything and everything to win this election." He referred to Romney as "the unprincipled prince of untruths."83 In the later column, he added: "Evidence continues to emerge that Romney is one of the most dishonest, duplicitous candidates to ever seek the presidency."84 Moreover, Romney has managed to combine a disregard for the truth with a lack of substance; his vagueness would embarrass Reagan and his deviousness would embarrass Nixon. In other words, he is a deceitful empty suit.
This is not to say that Barack Obama is a candidate to inspire confidence or enthusiasm. Whether from conviction, strategy or timidity, he has not staked out a progressive position with any consistency or tenacity, and at times he seems to lack imagination. I wish that we had a strong liberal on the Democratic ticket.
That reaction is common on the left and has led some to rebel. Chris Hedges recently declared that he will vote for the Green Party.85 His basic argument is that "major correctives to American democracy have come through movements . . . that have operated outside the mainstream," and that the right course is to support those efforts by voting for their proponents. That conclusion is familiar, abstractly cogent and foolish. I can offer the last opinion without undue smugness, as one who strayed from the fold under similar circumstances: in 1980, I abandoned Jimmy Carter as insufficiently liberal and voted for the third-party candidate John Anderson. Mr. Hedges sees such a desertion as a statement of principle and a critique of the system. It is, instead, an exercise in pique, a self-centered and unrealistic demand that the world go one’s way.
A vote for a third party or write-in candidate is a vote not merely thrown away, but thrown to the opposition. Is Hedges sufficiently unaware to think that the choice of Romney or Obama makes no difference? Is he complacent about a Romney win? Apparently so: "The November election is not a battle between Republicans and Democrats. It is not a battle between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. It is a battle between the corporate state and us." Hedges lists some entirely valid criticisms of Mr. Obama, and praises the Green Party leader, but neglects to evaluate Romney, who is the real alternative. He somehow sees the barrage of advertising by Republicans and Democrats, attacking each other, as a single corporate campaign to convince us not to vote for a third party. He is talking nonsense, both in his apocalyptic picture of the corporate menace and in the implied notion that the two candidates are equally committed to "the corporate state."
Leave aside his exaggeration and lack of focus. Third parties or non-party movements have, as Hedges argues, put forth important progressive ideas, but they haven’t implemented them for the simple reason that they never win national elections. The agenda is set by the party which does. Hedges will, in a tiny way, directly help the Republicans; to the extent that his argument has influence, he will have a slightly larger impact; others independently of the same disposition will push the result further in that direction. They need to recall that the most important potential impact of any third party which is at all successful is demonstrated by Florida, Ralph Nader, and the outcome of the 2000 election.
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83. http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/01/liberty-to-lie/
84. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/03/opinion/blow-is-romney-unraveling.html
85. http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/why_im_voting_green_20121029/
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