TheBigIguana
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Yet you've also yet to give me a reason that someone should vote for him that isn't idiotic. Ball's in your court really.
Current Affairs General US politics (ie, not POTUS related)
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There is no reason. Any and all votes for Kanye West are idiotic. But idiots exist. Hell, West himself is an idiot.
He'll get votes as a joke, "for the memes", and from those deliberately being contrarian. It happens in the UK all the time, but luckily its always in constituencies where it never matters, usually the serving Prime Ministers constituency. The US electoral system is a bit different because its presidential - we don't vote for a PM directly, we vote for MPs.
So maybe that's the problem in terms of you understanding what I mean as it's never really been seen before in US elections beyond Nader etc. who were still serious candidates in their own way. West's candidacy is something new - it's not serious, it only has one goal - to help Trump.
TheBigIguana
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So again you can only give me idiotic reasons or that they would do it for no reason. Just mindlessly voting right?
Yet you start this out by calling out black people as the ones who will be split. Not the young voters who would do it "for the memes" nor groups who have a history of voting third party that black people don't (I did some research, they're typically the lowest demographic in terms of third party votes: https://ropercenter.cornell.edu/how-groups-voted-2016). Again man, I don't need an answer if you don't have one, but I'm asking why are they the ones who are going to swing the election by being idiots?
They're the primary aim. Of course it won't be just blacks voting for West, but they're the primary target audience for clear reasons - they're expected to vote overwhelmingly for Biden so any disruption to that demographic will benefit Trump. Trump isn't going to lose hardly any black voters to West as he has hardly any in the first place.
So I'm just talking about the obvious intent, not the definitive only demographic that will vote for West.
But I understand your issue now, so let me be clear - no, I don't think ONLY blacks will vote for West. That'd be a dumb thing to think and would indeed be racist as you'd be assuming only blacks were stupid enough to do so. No, I'm simply saying they're the key target demographic.
TN Toffee
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He’s technically right, that in an EXTREMELY unlikely scenario where the entire election hinges on the outcome of one single state that is decided by maybe less than a 1000 votes (like Florida in 2000), then sure, a joke candidate could actually throw the election.
Looking at the map right now though, I don’t think it’ll be that tight of a race either way. The situation here will either stay about the same/continue to deteriorate and Biden will probably win somewhat comfortably, or if by some miracle we actually get a handle on things/the virus actually does disappear, then Trump most likely wins comfortably.
TheBigIguana
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Well the thing that bothered me, which I think he's acknowledged was a mistake, was calling out black voters at the start of this and just to further my point in 2000 only 1% of African-Americans voted third party. Other races were 3-4%. Ok maybe as a joke he gives people a small problem, I still think it is moronic, but lets be smart about where we aim that.
Here's the thing - Obama won both his elections without the majority white vote. Some of that is conscious racism, the other part is subconscious bias, where people vote for what they identify with. Not all people, but some, and we're talking exclusively about the "some" here.
Similarly, the black vote then went down for Clinton compared to Obama. Again similarly, white women voted more for Clinton than Obama. It's just human nature rather than racism/misandry etc. Just a simple reality that has played out in every election since the dawn of time. If Ocasio-Cortez ever runs for president, her Latino voteshare will dwarf anything Obama/Clinton/Biden could ever get - it is what it is.
What also happened in 2016 was third party candidates got a lot more votes than usual, due to dissatisfaction with the candidates. Both Johnson and Stein trebled their vote count.
So, with Biden not massively enthusing his base in the same way Obama did, and Trump being unpopular, the door is open for third party protest votes to soar again.
So no, not a mistake - again, I was pointing out the primary threat for the above reasons and what the whole point of him running is. It's plausible for him to get, say, 0.5% of the vote in any given state. If that state is Florida, you're talking 50,000 votes. If Michigan, it's 20,000 votes. These are historically enough votes to turn an entire election, and it is very valid to state that the primary aim of West running is to dilute the black vote inparticular.
TN Toffee
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Agreed. Also, perhaps a better use for his personal money than this vanity project/publicity stunt would have been to forego that taxpayer funded PPP loan and just pay his employees who were out of work due to COVID from his pocket.
TheBigIguana
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But crucially, those were all real candidates with other things to vote for them for. Johnson and Stein ran real campaigns and are in parties that have real followings. This is a clown show.
sdk
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It's not implausible in theory, but as a practical matter I don't think the present moment (which admittedly may be decisively different by November) is very conducive to gag votes due to the combination of coronavirus risk and voter suppression efforts. I don't invite you to prove me wrong.
Completely agreed, which is why Johnson/Stein got up to near 4% of the vote in some states. Johnson 3.2% nationally, Stein 1%. West won't touch the sides of those figures.
West, unfortunately, has something neither of those did - name recognition. It's honestly not implausible for him to get 0.5% even if he did absolutely nothing from now to election night and just put his name on the ballot box. As said, we've seen Lord Buckethead in the UK get 0.4% of the vote against a PM simply because the name Lord Buckethead was on the ballot - he did literally nothing to earn those votes; there really are just a sizeable amount of stupid people out there. Don't think of it with your brain - you're obviously well read, responsible, reasoned out your vote; but really mate there's just so many people who don't do the same.
I think nationally he'll poll around 0.3% if I had to guess, but the problem with that is even a pathetic showing like that is conceivably enough to swing two or three states. That's the danger, and it'd be wise for the Democrats to highlight it and stress every vote counts.
BirkenheadBlue
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this makes a lot of sense, I feel for him and those around him. Managing Bipolar is a tricky beast.
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