It’s quite hard to believe that of a nation of more than 300 million individuals, each with different viewpoints, background, experiences, and mentalities, everyone in America is expected to choose between two parties with complex ideologies. In most countries, there is a multi-party system where people pick the party that most closely fits their beliefs. In the United States, we’re not a fan of the whole “memorizing” thing, and so we just stick with the two party system to keep it as simple as possible.

The two major parties are often portrayed by the media as the only parties putting someone up for election. As someone who is — debatably — part of the media, and holds myself to a high journalistic standard — also debatable — I don’t want to play into the two-party system which constricts the American voters.

If there are any readers who are unhappy with our two candidates, I want to inform you of the third-party candidates running for the presidency in 2016. Instead of laying out their policy points and losing the few readers I have — hi Mom — I planned to break down these candidates based on who they are as people. So, here is how each of the major third-party candidates is like the people your blood-relatives decide to marry. They’re not good enough and you don’t hear about them too much, but they’re still just kind of there.

Evan McMullin, Independent, Never Trump: Your Sister’s Husband

Evan McMullin could totally beat you to a pulp. That’s part of the reason why you say you like him. Let’s be clear, he’s a super nice guy. But his stories of punching Al Qaeda members in the face during his CIA days definitely makes you feel inferior.

She’s not your sister anymore, she’s his wife, at least that’s how your parents refer to her. Yeah, it’s gotten to that point.

The weird thing is, nobody really knew where he came from. Your sister almost married a real asshole before him, and when she realized how badly she was treated, she married the next guy who spoke in a respectful tone. It’s almost like he saved her from the other guy. He showed up to family events when they announced getting married, and then we never saw too much of him afterwards.

He’s still the Alpha male, though.

Gary Johnson, Libertarian Party: Your cousin’s husband

Why did your cousin get married at 23? More importantly, why did she marry a 45 year old divorced dad? Her parents tried to stop her, but she didn’t listen because she was too busy loving the Johnson.

The first time he meets you, he disregards your handshake and goes for a kiss on the cheek right away, and a kiss on the lips for your mom. Also, he’s not afraid to kiss your cousin in front of everyone else. With tongue. It makes you slightly uncomfortable when he tries to give parenting advice to your aunt and uncle to use on his wife.

When it comes to an actual discussion, when you ask him questions, he doesn’t believe in anything, or care to be quite honest. The topic turns to gay marriage. His response “I don’t care, as long as they’re not trying to kiss me!”

When your parents and aunt and uncle are complaining about taxes, he butts in that there “shouldn’t really be taxes.” When asked how government services would paid for, he responds that everyone would just figure it out for themselves.

His way of solving problems is to not deal with them and hope they work themselves out. He cites Darwin’s “Survival of the Fittest” theory when presented with most problems, and leaves the room. Maybe you weren’t “fit” enough to be invited to the wedding?

Gary Johnson is your new cousin-in-law, and he doesn’t give a sh*t if it doesn’t have to do with Gary Johnson.

Jill Stein, Green Party: Your Uncle’s New Wife

Your Uncle’s first wife was controlling, and the moment his kids left for college he got out of there. Everyone thinks he went to the other end of the spectrum by marrying Jill Stein, but you know he secretly can’t stay away from women who take charge. Jill Stein appears to be extremely easygoing, but actually doesn’t just control your uncle, but your entire family over minuscule things. Don’t even mention name-brand washing detergents.

For some reason her hair is gray, but everyone is pretty sure she dyed it that way. Also, when she’s not wearing women’s suits for work, her dresses look like they were made for the poetry slam after a long day at Woodstock.

Your Uncle brags that she went to Harvard, but nobody really knows how that influenced her life at all.

Jill locked herself in a room for two days because Bernie Sanders isn’t progressive enough and even he’s gone. You try to tell her that saying Bernie isn’t progressive enough is like saying the Pope isn’t Catholic enough, but that sparks a whole other discussion about separation of church and state.

Also, she might still have LSD trips, and they might be flashbacks from the ’70s, but they might also be from last week. All your friends think that she’s super cool, but that’s probably because her brownies aren’t like any other grandma’s.

Just because these third party candidates are crazy, doesn’t mean the two-party ones aren’t. So, have fun picking the leader of the free world from the looney-toon bin.

Josh Feinblatt is a sophomore television, radio, film major. You can follow him on Twitter @josh_is_fein or reach him at jfeinbla@syr.edu.

 

Published on September 11, 2016 at 9:57 pm