As we get deeper into this crapshoot election season, you may find yourself voting for a candidate you don’t particularly like or agree with simply to prevent the election of another candidate who you hate even more. This logic is often used to put down Gary Johnson supporters who might “accidentally” get Donald Trump elected, and it’s the logic that will make many people I know vote for Trump because to them, Hillary Clinton is utterly despicable.

People can be bad and commit crimes, so we need to elect a government to corral this behavior; that much is obvious. The problem is, how do you control the inherent immorality of people by electing some of those very same inherently immoral people to stop the other immoral people? The logic of government is circular, and anyone could find a reason to disagree with any one particular candidate. In truth, most of our politicians are flawed in some way or another.

Let’s start with the obvious one.

Donald Trump

Ignoring his countless faux pas and unwillingness to recount the generally offensive nature of those faux pas (racist, sexist, insensitive etc.), Donald Trump runs as an anti-immigration, pro-life, pro-war debt fighter. While I can respect the ideal of reducing our debt, being pro-war entirely negates the notion of saving money. If Trump were allowed to invade Iraq and Syria with American troops, ending ISIS, he would be spending a lot. The thing is, we already spend more on our military than the next eight nations combined, but whatever (Hillary is okay with this too, skip ahead to learn more). Trump would also be spending enormous amounts of money building his proposed wall between us and Mexico and then deporting all illegal immigrants as well as beneficiaries of the DREAM Act. Those beneficiaries, by the way, are children who had no choice in being brought to the U.S. by their parents.

Trump’s disjointed logic does not stop there: He would like NATO to help eliminate ISIS, but also wants our country to leave NATO. He wants to end ISIS, but has no plans to help Iraq or Syria attain stability aside from stealing their oil. He bashes Clinton for supporting the Iraq War but his running mate did too. Trump says he does not believe in global warming, but one of his hotels in Ireland now has a seawall to prevent rising sea levels from eroding away his golf course. He wants the military to illegally torture combatants but the military is trained to reject illegal orders such as his. All those illegal immigrants he wants to deport? He’s hired some.

Trump either unknowingly or willingly misunderstands the implications of his proposed actions: He wants to reduce the enormous national debt, either by forcing our creditors to accept less than they are owed (which would spike and ruin our incredibly-low interest rates with them) or by printing excess money to give to them. Printing money only reduces the value of it, a fundamental idea of inflation that anyone who’s taken an introductory economics course would understand. Trump’s not stupid; he’s run some very successful businesses. So how can he be so objectively wrong?

Trump’s notorious flip-flopping is partially due to his convoluted speech patterns: when discussing taxes for the wealthy, he said

"I said that I may have to increase on the wealthy — I'm not going to allow it to be increased on the middle class — now, if I increase it on the wealthy, that means they're still going to be paying less than they're paying now. I'm not increasing it from this point, I'm talking about increasing from my tax proposal,"

If you analyze that quote several times over, you will agree that he did say he will reduce the taxes that the wealthy currently pay. But the fact that his ideas are so dense and poorly-phrased allows him to hide behind a veil of confusion. Sometimes, it’s obvious that he’s trying to not give a real answer. For instance, he said, “I’m not advocating to have guns in classrooms … But remember, in some cases … trained teachers should be able to have guns in classrooms.” He literally contradicted himself in the same interview. He knows he’s being deceitful and opaque, and so he hides.

Donald Trump is a weak man who deals in subterfuge and lies, maintaining a willful disregard for science, economics, and general human kindness. As the only candidate in modern U.S. history to not release his tax returns, he’s obviously hiding, fearful of people seeing what defines him most: his money. Please, do not vote for the most fundamentally flawed candidate on the 2016 ballot.

Hillary Clinton

On a surface level, and especially when compared to the Donald, Hillary Clinton seems respectful, full of regard for human life and the welfare of the country and planet. The Clinton Foundation, after all, works to support global health and wellness, economic development, and the fight against climate change. She also has taken a public stand against Wall Street on her website and when asked directly. But how can someone stand against Wall Street when, historically, three of her top five supporters have been Goldman Sachs, Citibank, and JP Morgan?

Prior to the 2008 financial crisis, Wall Street had the full trust of Americans as a cash cow for the nation, and Hillary and her husband had no issues accepting donations from large investment and securities firms. Really, no politicians had an issue with it. It wasn’t until they royally fucked the economy that Wall Street was exposed as a potential source of self-serving political influence. The Clintons were suddenly holding political poison.

But the 2008 recession didn’t really change Hillary’s mind: she was paid $675,000 by Goldman Sachs in 2013 for only three speeches, and that’s not a one-time thing. Wall Street bankers still openly acknowledge she best represents their interests, and their donations have not slowed. She’s just as much a liar as Trump, but in a less egregious and obvious manner. Let’s please stop pretending she’s not like every other politician: disingenuous and power-oriented.

Let’s focus instead on her effect on global health: As a senator in 2004, Clinton “blasted Pentagon officials … for not properly screening soldiers returning from Iraq” for depleted uranium poisoning. Depleted uranium, one of the most effective materials for armor plating and anti-tank warheads, was being inhaled in trace amounts by U.S. soldiers in Iraq, who, after returning, were diagnosed with cancer or radiation poisoning.

Depleted uranium warheads, praised for their ability to penetrate enemy armor, were first implemented in 1991 during the First Gulf War by the US and NATO, and bombs containing the substance were also dropped in Bosnia, and Serbia Depleted uranium saw its heaviest use in the Second Gulf War of the 2000s. Hillary Clinton, by the way, supported all of these usages, either as First Lady or senator.

Depleted uranium is "depleted" because it mostly lacks U-235, the less stable uranium isotope required for nuclear reactors and fission bombs. It still contains the radioactive U-238 isotope, which spits out alpha particles. Though these particles are easily blocked by clothes, skin, and any obstacles of appreciable thickness, warheads and armor plating disperse a fine depleted uranium powder into the air when fired or destroyed in a combat environment. This powder, when inhaled, peppers your insides with the harmful, poisoning alpha particles. In 2006, an ex-KGB agent seeking asylum in the UK was killed by alpha particles after ingesting polonium-210 in a cup of tea, presumably put there by Putin’s command.

Why is depleted uranium so important then? That powder was inhaled again and again by Iraqi civilians, particularly in cities that saw heavy fighting in the 2000s, like Fallujah. Cancer rates and birth defects in these areas are definitively higher as a result. The pictures are absolutely terrifying and appalling.

Uranium warheads are the primary armament of the M1A2 and M1A1 Abrams tank, and the A-10 Thunderbolt, none of which will be retired before 2021.

What did Hillary do about this? Back in 2004, she acknowledged the health risks associated with depleted uranium, but in 2012 when she was Secretary of State, the US, UK, France, and Israel were the only countries in the world to vote against a UN moratorium on depleted uranium use. She knew it was unsafe and did nothing to stop the suffering of civilians. A newer alloy of amorphous tungsten with the same properties as depleted uranium has existed since 2003. So why, knowing the risks, has Hillary Clinton directly supported the proliferation of depleted uranium warheads throughout our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, littering the two countries with radioactive powder, that, when inhaled, released harmful alpha decay into civilian lungs?

An article in the Huffington Post explains that Hillary’s consistent commitment to warfare and radiation poisoning stems from her support for the military-industrial complex; it’s hard to deplete uranium of its U-235 isotope, and requires large, expensive factories. She supported every war plan the CIA brought to the table, destabilizing Iraq and toppling Saddam Hussein for WMDs that didn’t even exist, paving the way for ISIS, and also toppling the Libyan government, spreading unregulated firearms far and wide and fueling war in Malawi, Boko Haram in Nigeria, and ISIS again to the east. Hillary Clinton also approved the CIA plan to topple Bashar al-Assad’s government, crippling Syrian stability.

The United States spends more on its military than the next eight nations combined, and Hillary Clinton has continually fed that fire. We have 10 nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, more than the entire rest of the world has put together. The military has live drone feeds running from the other side of the planet on a near 24/7 basis. We have around 800 “base sites” in 80 countries around the globe. Do we really need all this? Do we really need someone in the White House who creates ideal conditions for war?

“In rare cases, great presidents learn to stand up to the CIA and the rest of the military-industrial-intelligence complex. JFK became one of the greatest presidents in American history when he came to realize the awful truth that his own military and CIA advisors had contributed to the onset of the Cuban Missile Crisis. The CIA-led Bay of Pigs fiasco and other CIA blunders had provoked a terrifying response from the Soviet Union. Recognizing that the U.S. approach had contributed to bringing the world to the brink, Kennedy bravely and successfully stood up to the warmongering pushed by so many of his advisors and pursued peace, both during and after the Cuban Missile Crisis. He thereby saved the world from nuclear annihilation and halted the unchecked proliferation of nuclear arms.”

-The Moderate Voice

Gary Johnson

As an anti-war, free market candidate, Gary Johnson strikes many as a fiscally conservative alternative to Hillary Clinton that isn’t as nasty as Donald Trump and also wants to drastically shrink our military budget. Unlike Trump, he’s actually business minded and for marijuana legalization: He was CEO of Cannabis Sativa Inc. As governor of New Mexico (1995-2002), he vetoed more than 750 bills (more than the other 49 governors combined), never increased taxes in six years, and left the state with a $1 billion budget surplus. He calls out crony capitalists almost as much as Bernie Sanders does. Unfortunately, my agreements with and support for Gary end there.

Mr. Johnson, in the interest of saving money, prefers privatized prisons, and, during his tenure as governor, constructed two new ones. In 1999, one of them run by Wackenhut Corrections Corp. had a riot, killing four inmates and a guard, the first prison guard killing in New Mexico in 10 years. All the other state-run facilities in New Mexico in 1999 had fewer killings than the private ones. That same year, a rash of riots in New Mexican private prisons forced the state’s attorney general to pursue a comprehensive, independent study, which Gary Johnson also attempted to veto.

Private prisons are statistically proven to be worse than state-run prisons, violating inmates’ rights, occasionally starving them, and actually lengthening their sentences. Prisoners working in a corporately-owned prison make sometimes as low as 16 cents an hour for their labor. Gary Johnson may be right about a lot of things, but he is empirically, objectively wrong in this case. Marijuana legalization may save us the trouble, time, and money of incarcerating so many people, but that doesn’t mean we get to neglect the human needs of other incarcerated Americans.

Jill Stein

The Green Party candidate, Jill Stein, deserves some coverage. Despite being the lowest polling candidate on the ballot (though she’s not even on the ballot in 23 states) and hilariously polling behind a write-in called “Independent Harambe” in July, Jill Stein makes the most bold, scientific stand of any of the candidates against global warming. She wants to ban fracking nation-wide and the United States running entirely on renewable energy sources by 2030. To accomplish this, she will cut the military budget by at least 50%, using the money instead to fund start-ups and job creation in the new green energy sector. All this is part of a “Green New Deal” that should dig us out of stagnant GDP growth and high unemployment.

Climate change is real and Jill Stein is a true saint for standing against it no matter what her numbers at the polls are. Unfortunately, her beliefs in science aren’t entirely in full. She also believes that vaccines are still a threat and should be heavily studied. Only one 1998 study suggested that, but it was so fraudulent that some of its own authors doubted the claim. Vaccines have been studied again and again: There is no threat and they are not dangerous.