Jill Stein Sounds Great, But The System Is Still The Problem. None of the Above 2024.

I know for sure that we aren’t voting our way out of this, which is why I am firmly on team None of the Above.

There is a lot of positive energy around the Jill Stein campaign from leftists and independents. She just named her running mate, a man nobody has heard of nationally named Butch Ware. She put out a very aggressive policy position on what she would do for black people if elected.

She is, by far, the most popular candidate running who is firmly against Israel’s genocide & occupation of the Palestinian people.

What Stein would do policy-wise sounds great. Jill has the luxury to promise the world, knowing she’ll never win & be held accountable to actually do any of it, even if her intentions are good.

BUT…

Jill Stein’s 2024 Presidential campaign seems to have adopted similar talking points to AOC’s 2018 campaign

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“None of the Above”

I published this section, “None Of The Above” on May 15, prefacing my position on voting in 2024 in an article about Jill Stein. 

“I don’t think we are voting our way out of this mess. NO CANDIDATE will be able to withstand the power of the Corporate Military Intelligence Apparatus. They can only play ball with it. I think this is all a distraction. We will likely end up with Donald Trump as President come January. That’s not an endorsement, it’s merely a prediction.

Being on Team “None of the Above” allows me to be highly critical of ALL of the 2024 Presidential candidates: Donnie “Tiny Hands” Trump, “Genocide Joe” Biden, Marianne “Orb Queen” Williamson, Robert F. “Boobie” Kennedy, Cornel “Curtis Mayfield” West, Jill Stein, Lars Mapstead, Claudia De La Cruz and the rest who are all running to be perceived, by many, as the biggest monster in the world.

We’re all losing, no matter who wins.”

https://www.indiemediatoday.com/i/144677056/none-of-the-above

Kyle Kulinski, Krystal Ball & Jill Stein: Don't Get Fooled Again!

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Corporate Media Would Need To Disappear (or At Least Mention Stein Occasionally)

In order for her to even have a chance, she would need the entire country to unplug from the duopoly horse race of corporate media. She would at least have to be mentioned by them as a contender, which she never is, because they don’t want to even let people know she exists and is running.

Sadly, corporate media still is where most of the country gets its political news & framing from. Definitely the portion of the public that votes. Stein has some of the more popular independent podcasters behind her, too. Because the establishment duopoly has the money and the control of the narrative via a complicit media, it’s virtually impossible for her (or any unapproved outside challenger) to gain enough traction nationally. Corporate media would control the narrative about her, if they ever decided to cover her as a serious candidate. 

If corporate media ever started smearing her, many people would believe it and it would be even worse than after 2016, when many Democrats blamed her for Hillary losing to Trump. Heaven forbid she actually had to compete with them at a national advertising level, buying ad time against them.

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The Ballot Access Issue & The Democrats

The campaign has struggled to get on state ballots and is dealing with signature & procedural challenges from the Democrats in New York, where Greens will not be on the ballot. There are active suits still being heard in Georgia and Wisconsin. The Dems also tried to boot the Greens in Nevada, but were unsuccessful.

1. Democrats sue to block Green Party from Senate race - The Montana Free Press, August 23, 2024

2. Democrats Get a Third-Party Hopeful Knocked off Pennsylvania Ballot, as Cornel West Tries to Get On - US News & World Report - August 21, 2024

3. “[Stein] conceded to The Washington Times that she must rely on a write-in campaign in at least four states.” - August 19, 2024

4. Democrats, others seek to toss Kennedy off November ballot in Georgia and New York - AP, August 19, 2024

5. Democrats try to block Green Party from presidential ballot in Wisconsin, citing legal issues - AP, August 14, 2024

6. Nevada Democrats sue to block Green Party from 2024 ballot - The Daily Indy, June 13, 2024

7. Democrats changed the 3rd party requirements for New York in 2020 & the green party fell more than 10k signatures short in 2024 - Spectrum Local News

The problem isn’t replacing the President. The problem is the system itself. Between the corporate media’s brainwashing of the public, in partnership with the political duopoly, there is little outside forces can do to penetrate this shield of control in 2024 at the federal level.

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The Voting Machines: Easily Manipulated by Malicious Actors

DS200 voting machines, where voters at polls and early voting sites submit their ballots, shown in November 2019 after the Palm Beach County supervisor of elections spent $15.7 million to buy them. (GREG LOVETT / THE PALM BEACH POST)

The voting process is also manipulated & sometimes rigged - and controlled by the duopoly. I recently subscribed to a new Substack by Joe Surkiewicz, who, in a piece titled “A Wish List for the Future,” mentions the #2 problem, behind breaking up corporate media, is the voting process & the machines.

What do I mean? Well, here are ten articles from the past 2 decades you should probably investigate further. 

1. Here’s a report from Politico about the 2024 machine hacking conference.

2. Earlier this year, a U of Michigan professor hacked a machine in front of a judge with a BIC pen

3. Pennsylvania county promises accurate tally after clerical error appears to flip votes for judges - AP, November 7, 2023

4. This NBC report from 2020 about the lies told about connectivity to the Internet

5. An article from ProPublica in 2019 citing how ES&S grew into a major player in the voting machine market, exploiting the market

6. These Hackers Reveal How Easy It Is To Hack US Voting Machines - Forbes, 2017

7. Hacking Convention Finds Voting Machines Were Easy To Hack - Buzzfeed News, 2017

8. How I Hacked An Electronic Voting Machine - Popular Science, 2012

9. A Truthout article from 2011 about the 2004 election being hacked in Ohio

   1. More about the 2004 hack from Wired Magazine

10. A Fortune Magazine article from 2006 about Diebold (now ES&S) machines

more about Democrats’ plan to infiltrate & disqualify challengers to their left in 2024:

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What’s The Greens’ Plan After Election Day?

I am concerned that there is energy and hope being directed into an effort that will effectively disappear once the election is over, or substantially shrink at minimum. What is the plan once the election is over, exactly? 

I feel like it’s my responsibility, since so few are doing it and I seem to be one of a few seeing it and saying something about it, to remind people that even if we got every ex-Bernie person on board, plus everyone to their left, that doesn’t get the Greens close to 5% (which only gets $20m of federal funding - how much did AIPAC alone pledge to spend to defeat 8 House Democrats? Even $20M is a drop in the bucket.). 5% of the 150M voters from 2020 would be 7.5 MILLION votes. So how do you expand your tent to get more people? 

The Greens have historically gone after disaffected Democrats, and with the genocide that the party has been enabling happening for almost 11 months now, plus the anointment of an unelected, cringe candidate that would never have emerged from a primary, there are plenty of Americans who have decided to never vote Democrat again. The net result of getting pissed off Dems on board will dilute & water down the Greens by accepting pseudo-neoliberals that just don't like the Gaza policy - but were on board with everything else until then. 

If the Green Party were smart, they would focus on workers and organizing the rank and file against management & corporate-friendly political creatures like Teamsters’ & UAW leadership. And continue the work beyond election day.  They could support and educate about worker co-ops and alternate structures to corporations to empower workers. THAT would actually expand their tent.

I know for sure that we aren’t voting our way out of this, which is why I am firmly on team None of the Above. Listen to the man himself, way ahead of his time.

If you feel like you have to vote for someone and decide to vote for Jill Stein, just know full well that’s not going to mean anything in the grand scheme. The next best thing to None of the Above in a rigged system is voting against the duopoly so neither side of the Uniparty gets YOUR consent, at least…

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What’s your plan for election day 2024?

• None of the Above?

• Team Red Genocide?

• Team Blue Genocide?

• Team Green (but then what after election day)?

• Team Libertarian?

• Other?

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Hi! I’m Indie. I champion corporate-free independent media which challenges the narratives that cable & broadcast media push on behalf of advertisers.

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