One More Political Blog Before the Election

(I will resume my history blogs very soon - just a few more political things I need to get off my chest.)

Don't you love it when you have a political conversation with someone and when you bring up something like the Constitution Party they tell you to get into reality - that a third party can never win. This has been said to me a few times lately. I tell folks that I am not very fond either of the two major political parties - that neither is representing me and my values. Of course, I am told, my values are antiquated. My morals no longer fit in today's society. That I am taking my Civil War reenacting too far and am living in the past.
No kidding - I have been told this! Recently! Just because of my traditional values.
The funny thing is, I have found most people I know outside of reenacting share my values and morals as well. Hmmm! One wouldn't know this by what's printed in the media, now would they?
Anyhow, because I will not vote for either of the two major parties, I am told that I am throwing my vote away.
So, please - - - -
Tell me how voting on my principles is throwing my vote away.
Tell me how voting for the "lesser of two evils" rather than voting for what I do believe in is throwing my vote away.
And speaking of the lesser of two evils, most folks tell me that I am voting for the greater of two evils if I do not choose their party! This comes from both camps, by the way (although, I must admit, the McCain camp is a bit more open to my choice of the Constitution Party over Lord Obama's followers).
Now, even if you actually feel you are voting for the lesser of two evils by picking McCain or Obama, you are still voting evil, are you not? Just one is...ahem...lesser.
Let me make this perfectly clear: I cannot - and will not - vote against my beliefs. Not just religious but moral - from the Constitution Party's web page (www.constitutionparty.com/):
In the first place, a wasted vote is a vote for someone you know does not represent your own beliefs and principles. A wasted vote is a vote for someone you know will not lead the country in the way it should go. A wasted vote is a vote for the "lesser of two evils." Or, in the case of John McCain and Barack Obama, what we have is a choice between the "evil of two lessers."

America has not elected a third party candidate since 1860. Do you know who won the presidential election in 1860? Abraham Lincoln, on the third party Republican ticket! So please don't say voting for a third party is throwing your vote away. Or that, because I brought up an example from the past that it's a bad thing. It's not. We here in the 21st century can learn from the past.
A third party has been elected before - once the word can get out, it can happen again.

Now, am I living in the past for the way I am voting? Am I throwing away my vote?
Maybe in some minds I am, but I will not vote evil. And that gives me a clear conscience.