Please don't vote for a third-party candidate

“Our Boys,” a provocative 2019 coproduction between HBO and Israeli television, posited a moral theory called “Judging by its end.” Was a young Israeli citizen who helped abduct a Palestinian, whom his confederates later gruesomely killed, guilty of murder? “In the end we used [the crowbar] to kill,” said the orthodox Jewish man under arrest, “but we didn’t bring it to kill. If you judge it by its end then what matters is what happened in the end.”

That scene, and that theory of morality, has resonated with me in any number of circumstances since the episode aired. Perhaps unexpectedly, none more so than in our current presidential election as three left-wing candidates — Jill Stein (Green Party), Cornel West (unaffiliated) and Claudia De la Cruz (The Party for Socialism and Liberation) — seem to be doing everything in their power to return Donald Trump to the White House.

This is not hyperbole. We could well be looking at a replay of the 2000 election when Ralph Nader’s 97,488 votes in Florida cost Al Gore that state’s electoral votes – and as a result, the White House. Gore lost Florida by 537 votes.

Bernard Tamas, a professor of political science at Valdosta State University, who wrote a book on third parties in U.S. politics, recently told the New York Times that to affect the outcome of the election the third-party candidates would “either have to have a large amount of support, or the election has to be remarkably close.”

With Donald Trump and Kamala Harris running neck and neck in seven key swing states, West, Stein and De la Cruz’s 1% to 2% of the vote could keep Harris out of the White House. Were the three of them to drop out of the race and throw their support to Harris it would be a potential game-changer in this election.

Ralph Nader and the people who voted for him, resulting in the election of George W. Bush, are responsible for the invasion of Iraq, catastrophic climate-change denialism, and the end of the constitutional right to an abortion in America.

Even Robert F. Kennedy Jr. who was polling higher those three left-wing candidates, realized that the best way to realize his political goals, was to drop out and back a major-party candidate — he endorsed Trump. (According to the Pew Research Center, a larger share of those prepared to vote for Kennedy, lean toward the Republican Party than the Democratic Party , 40% vs. 26%.)

West, Stein and De la Cruz could talk you blue in the face about why they won’t do that, centered mostly on how Harris and the Democratic Party don’t begin to address the systemic problems of American capitalism and how her support of Biden’s policies in the Middle East, and especially with regard to the war in Gaza, is unsupportable.

But actions have consequences and if you “judge by the ends,” as “Our Boys” laid out, then it follows that Ralph Nader and the people who voted for him, resulting in the election of George W. Bush, are responsible for the invasion of Iraq, catastrophic climate-change denialism, and the end of the constitutional right to an abortion in America.

Of course you can never know for sure what someone is going to do once he or she becomes president. And we don’t know if Gore would have won re-election.

But we do know that George W. Bush appointed John Roberts and Samuel Alito in 2005, while Gore would have almost certainly appointed two pro-choice justices resulting in, all other things being equal, a 5-4 liberal Supreme Court majority today. We know that Bush’s people were spoiling for a fight in Iraq, while Gore was not likely to invade. Gore made a top priority of environmental issues, while Bush opposed the Kyoto Protocol an international climate agreement.

Mr. Nader, and all your voters: That’s quite a legacy.

Hillary Clinton wrote in her 2017 memoir, “What Happened,” that Jill Stein helped throw the 2016 election to Trump. Historians and political pundits aren’t convinced that Stein had that significant an effect on the race.

But this time around, with a historically competitive election, Stein, West and De la Cruz could cost Harris enough votes to tip the electoral college in Trump’s favor. It’s not for nothing that Republican operatives have been working so hard to bolster third party candidates, and Stein in particular. Add to that the growing pro-Palestinian sentiment to vote for neither (or even for Trump).

We don’t know what kind of a president Kamala Harris would be. But she and Trump have track records, and that is as reliable predictor as any.

If Trump wins the White House by less than 1%, we can expect that vacancies on the Supreme Court would ensure a right-wing court for decades. Benjamin Netanyahu and Vladimir Putin will have carte blanche to do whatever they want. And Trump has already told us what he has in mind for his domestic foes.

 Elections matter. Vote wisely.

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