system.  One commentor pointed out the use of lobbying once the pol is in office.  Other levers include various small scale public lobbying (FB, Blogging, yard signs, browbeating friends and neighbors), pushing the formal media (Maddow does this by example and sometimes verbally as well -"come on guys, see you can cover this"), making media events (occupy) or, and maybe the most importantly, show up and run for local offices of all types.  The authoritarians love to do do that last item, deny them that chance. tl;dr -- political power comes from more than voting for 1 pres or another.  Stop skimping efforts that you can do as a person (other than voting). Eric Well sure there are other things you can do, and you may or may not think it moral to vote for one side, but neither of those imply that you should avoid voting for the candidate who most matches your views just to keep the major party that you dislike the most out of office. tl;dr Just because you can do other things too doesn't mean you're justified in voting for a lizard. ttp://skepticsplay.blogspot.com/ trivialknot Yudkowsky is part of the Less Wrong community, the Singularity Institute, and the author of Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality.  He is definitely opposed to the "arguments as soldiers" attitude. Nordog6561 I figured as much, but it was nice to have you and Eric comment on the point. Being wrong, and being able to admit being wrong is a