You're right...it is basically the same as not voting. You're wrong by saying in either case it's not "giving a vote to Hick" and "you're bad at math".
Here's the example:
You have a voting pool of 100 people. Your candidates are Hickenlooper, Tancredo and Republican candidate.
After the election, with many people pissed at the "R" candidate, here's what you have:
Hick - 45 votes
Republican - 39 votes
Tancredo - 16 votes
I'll be generous and say that only 75% of the Tancredo voters would have otherwise voted for the Republican candidate (I seriously doubt many liberals are going to vote for Tancredo, no matter how pissed they are at the democrat party). If you split that vote 75% for the Republican and 25% for Hickenlooper, here's what you have:
Republican - 51 votes
Hick - 49 votes
You also have a governor who will most likely be
closer to your beliefs than the other guy.
It's not bad math. It's reality.