One of the challenges of having a conversation like the voting one in the blogosphere is that it tends to happen in bits and parts all over the place. As I am aware now that some people (other than the commentators) have read my entry into the conversation, I thought I'd point out this post by Disputations. I think Tom offers up here a subtle but important contribution and is the first response to Zippy's critique that I find meritorious. I'm not sure it answers everything, but it does a couple of things that seem to be right: (1) it accepts Zippy's point about the wrong proportionate reasons we often speak of when we say we are going to vote for the less imperfect major-party candidate; (2) it offers a response to Zippy's conclusion on the meaning/nature of the act of voting that seems to better (a) accept his marginal view analysis of the act of an individual vote and yet (b) doesn't seem to reduce the meaning/nature of voting to merely that, rejecting its other components; and (3) offers up a potential proportionate reason that would permit a vote for the less imperfect major-party candidate or a third-party candidate.
Ater reading Tom's approach some might think to claim "Duh, isn't that obvious!" I think it is more subtle than it is simple. I also think that, even if correct, the path we have taken to there shows some real errors in the cultural way we speak of voting for the lesser of two evils, potentially even in how some of our bishops have spoken of it, even if the conclusion reached is practically the same.
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