News from outside of Australia
There are orders of magnitude more nonvoters than third party voters. The nonvoters swing elections, not third party voters.
I am yet to find a single us presidential election with only two candidates. Third parties have and will always exist. Any candidate who doesn't account for this fact is irresponsible.
If harris loses its her fault and no one else's.
I'd argue Kamala Harris is costing Kamala Harris votes in a key state.
I guess but taking action against Israel is not really consistent with her election strategy of winning over Never Trumpers.
Both can be (and are) true.
The transparently Russia-backed spoiler candidates with absolutely no path to victory in a FPTP election have no value to anyone beyond their ability to siphon off votes from the two viable candidates.
RFK pulled out when it became clear that he would disrupt Trump more than Harris, and Stein remains in the race because she remains a valuable diversion for would-be Democrat voters.
...and yes - Kamala sacrificing the left to court the centre right by adopting Republican framing and policies isn't particularly effective because if people want a Republican, they'll vote Republican.
the green party has nominated a candidate, and ran in every single presidential election since 1996. why would they suddenly decide to drop out now?
They should drop out because they have no path to victory, typically capture <1% of the vote, peaked at 2.7%, have no Senate seats, no house seats, no governorships - state or territorial, no chambers seats - upper or lower... But most importantly, they're siphoning votes away from the more progressive viable option, providing meaningful support to the worst possible option in doing so.
those are not circumstances unique to this election.
if the democrats are running a campaign that cannot succeed without a third party abandoning the strategy they've been using constantly for the past 28 years, they have already lost.
the greens are not a chaotic force doing unpredictable things. if democrats don't account for the greens doing what they always do, its their own fault if they lose.
Yes - the Democrats are at fault for arrogantly running an ineffective campaign like the institutionalists they are, and the Greens are at fault for aiding a hostile state actor and the unabashed fascists.
Both are bad, though not in a comparable way.
The only correct take to have.