Jill Stein is working hard to elect Trump.

[Coyotl]

Stein, the Nader of 2016, tweets an article showing Trump ahead in the polls. What a freeper!

Dr. Jill Stein ‏@DrJillStein Oct 20
We're at 5.5% in a recent poll. Our message of peace and justice is working. #InvestYourVote
http://www.investors.com/politics/trump-leads-clinton-by-one-point-going-into-debate-in-ibdtipp-tracking-poll/

We know Republicans have funneled to the Green Party in the past. This year, too much dark money to know how much they are paying Green candidates.

[Gothmog]

1. A vote for Jill Stein is a vote for trump

[Donald Ian Rankin]

7. No, that's unfair - it's a spoiled ballot.

There are three options in the coming election:

Vote for Clinton: +1
Abstain, spoil your ballot or vote third party: 0
Vote for Trump: -1

Depending on how you look at it, voting for Stein is half as bad as voting for Trump, or half as good as voting for Clinton.

[LongtimeAZDem]

11. So, just call it a half-assed vote for Trump (nt)

[NurseJackie]

20. If it doesn't benefit Hillary, then it DOES benefit Trump...

... when someone votes (or doesn't vote) in a way that does not ADVANCE or INCREASE Hillary's numbers... then that means Trump needs FEWER votes to catch up or overtake her.

[Gothmog]

22. A vote for a third party candidate is a vote for trump

There is no other way of looking at this.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

24. Reasserting a wrong fact does not make it less wrong.

To put that in perspective: if all the people who are actually going to vote third party were to vote for Trump, he would almost certainly win. So it's really important not to occlude the difference.

[Gothmog]

37. You are wrong-the margin of victory for Hillary Clinton will be very important

A vote for a third party candidate lowers the Clinton margin of victory and is a vote for trump

[Donald Ian Rankin]

38. The first of those claims is true, the second is nonsense.

A vote for a third party candidate has no effect on the margin of victory, any more than a spoiled ballot does.

As far as I can tell, you're working on the model that the "default" or "neutral" position is a vote for Clinton. I think that that is foolish - the default or neutral position in any election is to not vote.

[Gothmog]

39. Voting for a third party candidate does affect the margin of victory

The math is the math. A vote for a third party candidate is a vote for trump. Your defense of votes for a third party candidates is simply wrong

[Donald Ian Rankin]

42. Yes, the maths is the maths!

The equation is very simple: 0 is not equal to -1.

Here are 538's current predictions for the popular vote:

Hillary Clinton 49.6%
Donald Trump 43.2%
Gary Johnson 5.6%
Other 1.5%

If a vote for a third party candidate was a vote for Trump, then Trump would be ahead by 50.3% to 49.6%.

Since it isn't, he is behind, by 43.2% to 49.6%.

[Gothmog]

44. Did you read your post before posting it?

The math is the math and your attempt at analysis is simply wrong. The vote to Johnson and Stein are what are keeping Hillary Clinton from breaking the 50% mark. A vote for stein or Johnson is a vote that keep Clinton from a higher margin of victory.

[Chasstev365]

2. She will have ZERO effect on this election!

Electoral Clinton Landslide!

[saltpoint]

3. Sorry to step on the toes of her

supporters, but I've had about enough of Dr. Stein.

I hope her pneumonia lifts and I hope after November 8 we seldom if ever hear from her again on the national political stage.

[still_one]

9. Ms. Stein's pneumonia was almost like Karma, after her insensitive twitter remarks

about Hillary on twitter, "prescribing Hillary to drop out":

""#HackingHillary, here's my prescription: Take a #JillChillPill and stop campaigning altogether to ensure global peace. #PagingDrStein," the now-deleted tweet read."

"By tweeting about Clinton's coughing, Stein, a physician by trade, appeared to be joining those who have attacked Clinton's health — attacks that have led some conservative news outlets as well as Republican nominee Donald Trump to embrace conspiracy theories that Clinton is severely ill."

http://www.businessinsider.com/jill-stein-deleted-a-tweet-hillary-clinton-jillchillpill-and-drop-out-2016-9

Too bad Ms. Stein that deleted Tweets show up in the strangest places.

[saltpoint]

10. She does seem to align with some shady

projects. I expected her to be a steadier presence, but she has been unfocused.

And in a national political campaign, 'unfocused' is not a good thing.

[grossproffit]

4. She's a troll.

[kevink077]

6. Bought and paid for by GOP

And a crack pot quack too.

[yardwork]

16. Bought and paid for by Putin, more like.

[NCTraveler]

5. She has destroyed the platform and integrity of the Green Party.

She has shown herself to be a political fool and mouthpiece for Trump.

One has to wonder at this point if she is also a corporate prop. Something doesn't smell right.

[MH1]

14. I kinda think Nader beat her to it.

And I was once a Nader supporter (pre Nov 2000*) and considered myself more green than blue. Nader's behavior woke me up about the sad state of the Green Party in this country.

Of course I also researched WHY 3rd parties basically don't work well in this country. Our voting system just doesn't allow it. We have to change that before the Green Party, or any other 3rd party, will amount to anything other than spoilers.


* the "not a dime's worth of difference" bullshit REALLY woke me up. When it became clear that Gore wasn't going to trounce Bush - i.e. when I realized how disappointing the American electorate is - we needed to be "all hands on deck" to get Gore elected and avoid the disaster of Bush. Continuing that line of rhetoric was highly destructive to the country, and did not advance the supposed goals of the Green Party one bit. I realized that the Green Party in this country is not what I thought it was, and have been an active (but usually somewhat disgruntled) Democrat ever since.

[BobbyDrake]

43. It's not that the deck is stacked against 3rd parties. It's the fact that national parties

simply don't spring into existence fully formed out of nowhere. Is there one city being run by Greens currently? One county? One township? No. So why should they expect to be able to run for President if they can't even win enough votes to run a school board?

Today's Green Party is nothing but a vanity project for whichever narcissist mouths enough of the right platitudes to fool their voters into thinking they're the next Green Party Savior like Stein did.

[oasis]

8. Jill Stein is the poster person for incompetence. Trump wouldn't

allow her to volunteer at any of his campaign headquarters after a 10 minute interview.

[JRLeft]

13. ^ This

[yardwork]

17. It's up to the Green Party to convince me and so fair they fail.

I was a registered Socialist in my twenties. I have strong alignment with Green Party ideals. Jill Stein is pathetic. She no more represents socialist ideals than Trump represents feminism.

That's her failure, not mine.

[Rocknrule]

15. Green = Get Republicans Elected Every November

[Hekate]

31. Only every 4 years. They can't be bothered to build from the ground up....

...which is how they would make a real impact for good.

Noooo, just show up for the presidential elections, take money from dubious sources because in their own minds they are so pure of heart they know their strange bedfellows won't hurt them, and pull just enough votes away from Democrats to make a GOP victory plausible in a close election.

I've watched this for enough years to conclude that this strategy is not about the Green candidate winning the presidency, but about making the Democratic Party suffer for sins real and imagined, no matter who gets hurt.

Am I cynical? Just a bit, just a bit.

[Rocknrule]

35. You're not wrong

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eric-zuesse/ralph-nader-was-indispens_b_4235065.html

Nader's nephew said it himself: "We want to punish the Democrats, we want to hurt them, wound them." And Ralph has the gall to deny that he was a spoiler.

[Rocknrule]

18. But you just doesn't understand how PRINCIPLED we are!

We can't just vote against our consciences! Revolution takes sacrifice! And if the lives and livelihoods of minorities and poor people is the price we have to pay for that, SO BE IT! #SpecialSnowflake #MyFirstElection #YOLOswag #MAGA

( in case it wasn't obvious)

[MineralMan]

19. She doesn't matter any longer.

In the meantime, another third party candidate, McMullin, has a pretty good chance of winning Utah, but nobody's paying any attention to him. People are only focused on the third party candidates who will never get any electoral votes.

Isn't that silly?

[madinmaryland]

21. What's interesting is he could take the state away from tRump. Assuming he is on the ballot

in a couple of other states with a high Mormon population, he could also shift the state(s) into the Clinton category by splitting the repub vote. The same could occur with Gary Johnson and Rump.

I don't think Stein will get more that 0.5% of the vote. Interestingly, I saw the first Gary Johnson yard signs here in SW Ohio a couple of days ago.

[LisaL]

27. That exactly is his goal.

He is anti-Trump republican. I guess he then hopes neither Clinton nor Trump get to 270 which means congress will decide and he could actually be picked as president.

[obamanut2012]

25. He's winning Utah because he's LDS

And, that's it. He will later probably run for Utah Gov or as a Rep or Senator, and will win, since Utah is basically an LDS theocracy.

[Coyotl]

30. He has Mormon support because Trump is a groper and an unacceptable, reprehensible sinner.

[LisaL]

33. Too bad he isn't taking that many votes from Trump in other states.

[LisaL]

26. McMullin isn't really "third party."

He is anti-Trump republican.

"Evan McMullin, a former C.I.A. official and a Republican who passionately opposes Donald J. Trump, announced Monday that he would run for president as an independent candidate."

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/09/us/politics/evan-mcmullin-independent-candidate.html?_r=0

[MineralMan]

28. He's not running as a Republican, so he's third party.

Simple equation.

[LisaL]

32. Yes, I know he is running as a third party.

But he is a republican.

[amb123]

23. TO HELL WITH THE TRUMPEN-STEIN MONSTER

CREATED BY THE THE MAD SCIENTIST OF MOSCOW! (You know who I'm talking about.)

Donald and Jill are the two sides of the same extremist coin.

[BainsBane]

29. She has said she prefers Trump to Clinton

which tells you what her values truly are.

[Amimnoch]

34. Exactly.

Until that comment I rather considered her to be a misguided ally.

She deserves nothing but contempt from anyone who'd consider them self a liberal, a Democrat, or a progressive.

She's beyond contempt at this point.

[Rocknrule]

36. "Tofu Palin" is the best nickname I've heard for her

[uponit7771]

41. +1

[GreenPartyVoter]

40. Election reform to prevent spoiled races is a must!

[geek tragedy]

45. Tofu Palin nt