I agree with Les AuCoin and others who have noted this week the number of progressives who declared in 2000 there was no difference between George W. Bush and Al Gore. Many of these people voted for third-party candidate Ralph Nader or didn't vote at all. The results of that election include not only the war in Iraq and the crash of the U.S. economy, but also the make up of the U.S. Supreme Court today. Elections do matter. All of us should make principled decisions in the ways we vote and conduct our public lives. Part of being principled is being smart and strategic. 2000 cost us a needless war and resulted in the Supreme Court rulings the majority of Americans oppose today. That election also resulted in a decade of inaction on climate change and a massive increase in inequality. It is a lesson worth remembering in 2016 and in the elections to follow.