Someone will win this election, but it won’t be We the People

I Voted stickers

The first election I voted in was 1996 and I voted a straight-ticket for the Republican party.

This year I led the South Carolina campaign for Jo Jorgensen, the Libertarian presidential candidate. The only woman running for President. The only third-party candidate on the ballot in all 50 states. A woman who was the Libertarian Party’s Vice Presidential candidate in that 1996 race.

This campaign felt like an underdog story because we were playing in a rigged game.

Since that 1996 race when I voted for – but didn’t much like – Bob Dole, I’ve been wondering how the two-party system has managed to let us down in cycle after cycle. How the people on the ballot are the best we can do. How our founding fathers might look at the corrupt duopoly and their Baby Boomer candidates and just facepalm.

Four years ago, I thought we had reached the deepest disappointment in election history. But it’s four years later and while the nation hasn’t exactly barreled headlong into World War III, we are experiencing 1) a pandemic, 2) an economic collapse, and 3) a deep divide between law enforcement and the citizens they’re meant to protect and serve.

Can it get worse?

Yes. Our rights are no longer being eroded they’re being openly violated. And no matter which major party wins, nothing will improve. No matter who gets elected, our government will continue to spend. Politicians will dream up new programs that benefit their grifter pals. The parties will amass wealth and power and gerrymander their way into staying there.

We live in an oligarchy. As they shut our businesses down and sent our children home and mailed us back our own money to buy groceries, they told us they would save us. But they can’t. They don’t even want to.

There is no evidence our government can do anything at all to help us. And there’s no incentive for them to make things better for us. Because we just keep electing them.

The only way our government can help is to get out of the way.

We must help ourselves. Open businesses to meet needs and solve problems, to earn money to feed and shelter our families. Form community groups to educate and protect our children. Unite in love and friendship to heal the sick, shelter the homeless, and feed the hungry. We must help ourselves and each other.

And government cannot be the tool. It cannot be the default mechanism. It cannot be the shared resource. It cannot be the unifying force. Because it is rotten. Our government is rotten with grifters, shysters, hucksters, and frauds. Even the good people who wish to serve are eaten alive by the machinery of power and greed. If Jo Jorgensen wins the Presidency, Congress will be stocked with duopoly puppets.

Twenty-four years ago, I cast my first ballot in a rigged game. The straight-party-ticket vote – a one button selection that solidifies control to a political party – was the first whiff that our system was rigged. By now, the stench of a rotten republic is suffocating.

I campaigned for, voted as, and remain Libertarian. I believe in freedom and we don’t have it. No matter what the oligarchy tries to tell us.

If we want to live free, we cannot wait for them to give the power back to us. We must take it.

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