Wasting Your Vote

I've never fully understood why people think voting for a third party (or independent) wastes your vote more than voting for those other two parties. Keith Burgess-Jackson raises a good objection to this belief. There's one, somewhat similar, objection I'd like to make. If you live in California, as I do, there's a very high probability that Kerry will take the electoral votes, but if you happen to be a conservative resident of Orange County and vote for Bush than the odds against you getting your way are overwhelming. The same holds true if you live in Texas, but you want to vote for Kerry.