If proclaiming that makes you feel better about yourself, then go right ahead. But generally, I find that anyone making an argument which amounts to saying "context doesn't matter" and "screw nuance" is flailing their arms and stamping their feet in the face of a complex situation that they don't care to try to understand.

This is another example of the either-or mentality. You would think that it would occur to either you or Tracy that there is no inherent conflict between saying that A) rape is not the woman's fault, and B) knowing the regressive cultural attitudes and social reality of some Muslim areas, there are nevertheless some things a woman would be wise to do in order to avoid being raped. But of course thinking that way wouldn't be as much fun for Internet arguments and opinion-mongering, would it?

It seems to me that the pamphlet was designed towards a practical end rather than a philosophical discussion about feminism. Here's a helpful analogy: if someone tells me not to walk through the ghetto at 4 in the morning wearing massive amounts of gold jewelry, I can get on a pedestal and give a speech about how muggings are not the victim's fault and I should be able to walk freely anywhere I want at whatever time I want. But until conditions in the ghetto improve, it's still pretty good advice.

No vote for a third party is ever a waste because it documents something. That for all the money and all the exposure, there are people who were unconvinced by either option and wanted to make sure you knew it.

So what you're saying is that your third-party vote is a purely symbolic gesture that lets you feel good about yourself and is basically the equivalent of flipping the bird to the establishment. A noble ideal for a fifteen-year old, maybe. But at least we can agree that it effects no actual change, as each successive Nader candidacy has shown. You would think that with the Democrats all ranting about how he cost them the presidency, they would have thought about how to capture those progressive voters the next time around, but clearly they have not, and the definition of insanity is to keep trying the same strategies that have clearly failed in the past.

Of course you might say that it's 'enablers' like me who allow the Democrats to go on without shifting leftward, but at that point the argument becomes a nebulous simulation of the prisoner's dilemma. Let's imagine an ideal scenario where everybody voted for the candidate they actually preferred instead of what they thought was realistic in a winner-take-all system - I still doubt that Nader would get more than 10% of the vote.

I'm pretty tired of everyone from disgruntled Hilary supporters to disillusioned progressives going through the most incredible contortions to try to convince everyone and themselves that there really is no difference between McCain and Obama, that for all we know, McCain could be a secret liberal, or that Obama will turn around and support another surge, or that the brave Democratic Congress will keep McCain at bay for four years. You can keep engaging in this sophistry if it makes you feel better. Back here in the real world, there's a reasonable expectation that Obama will at least scale down the war rather than escalate it like McCain has repeatedly sworn to do, and that he will perhaps be just a smidgin less inclined to "bomb Iran". Let's not even mention things like Supreme Court nominations and bills on abortion, etc. If you don't care about a few thousand more deaths here or there, that's fine. For the rest of us, even the Democrats' half-assed, cowardly non-opposition to the war is better than the Republicans' full-throttle suicidal support of it.

Not voting or voting third-party in a presidential election is probably the laziest and most ineffective way to attack the system. It's much more effective to try to elect third-party politicians on a local or state level, contribute to PAC's, and push for electoral reform and runoff voting. Targeted attacks like what Glenn Greenwald is doing against specific members of Congress who do more harm than good as Democrats are also a good idea. But when it comes to a vote that happens once and every four years and has such a tremendous effect, as long as there are only two viable choices, it is your duty to prevent the more devastating one.

The point is that the problem is with the narrow and corrupt electoral system, and changes in this can only happen in the long term from the bottom up. To try to effect it immediately at the top of the chain is silly and futile, particularly when you already know it won't work.

Your entire argument is based on the assumption that Americans are so gullible and so prone to right-wing fearmongering that they would have elected Bush anyway. Which is actually the same assumption that people use to justify the Democrats' cowardice and Obama's support for the FISA bill. If you really think the majority of the country is made up of regressive nationalistic rednecks, then shit, the Democrats in their current form really ARE the best we can hope for. You expect the same people you just described to join you in electing an actually progressive candidate?

I happen to disagree slightly with this assessment, but regardless, you're pretty much admitting what I said, that you're more interested in making a symbolic gesture than effecting some sort of change. As for your elegant homophobic metaphors, as long as you live in the States, voting third-party doesn't somehow magically insulate you from the effects of who wins the presidency (though perhaps being a member of the financially secure upper class does). So whether you like it or not, we're all going to be sodomized regardless by the winners, and I'd prefer to try to make it slightly less painful in the meantime.