> If I don't vote, and if many others also stay home, both parties would scramble to gain support and third parties that previously had no chance at least have a potential market opportunity to break the two party system.
That won't work. A non-vote says absolutely nothing about what needs to be done to get that vote. A vast quantity of non-votes are, in fact, not gettable: most non-voters are apathetic and they will never vote, full stop. Many others are, for lack of a better term, snowflakes who will refuse to vote for anyone who does not implement every bullet point of the program that they have in their head, and will therefore never vote, because their standards are impossible to meet.
Basically, most non-voters are either lost causes, really fickle, or have demands that rebuff a larger number of reliable voters and are incompatible with each other -- go and try to figure out who wants what. It's impossible. Parties can't read your mind, if you want better candidates you have to communicate your demands explicitly, and not voting communicates effectively nothing. It's like refusing to choose between spaghetti and curry and secretly hoping they offer you a hamburger instead. They won't. They'll cycle through a dozen other dishes you hate until, perhaps, they randomly stumble upon something you like, (or something you think you like, but ultimately don't.) It's not their fault: you're not telling them what to do! A better methodology is to vote in local races or primaries: that will show up in their statistics, letting them know what it is that you do like.
That won't work. A non-vote says absolutely nothing about what needs to be done to get that vote. A vast quantity of non-votes are, in fact, not gettable: most non-voters are apathetic and they will never vote, full stop. Many others are, for lack of a better term, snowflakes who will refuse to vote for anyone who does not implement every bullet point of the program that they have in their head, and will therefore never vote, because their standards are impossible to meet.
Basically, most non-voters are either lost causes, really fickle, or have demands that rebuff a larger number of reliable voters and are incompatible with each other -- go and try to figure out who wants what. It's impossible. Parties can't read your mind, if you want better candidates you have to communicate your demands explicitly, and not voting communicates effectively nothing. It's like refusing to choose between spaghetti and curry and secretly hoping they offer you a hamburger instead. They won't. They'll cycle through a dozen other dishes you hate until, perhaps, they randomly stumble upon something you like, (or something you think you like, but ultimately don't.) It's not their fault: you're not telling them what to do! A better methodology is to vote in local races or primaries: that will show up in their statistics, letting them know what it is that you do like.