Comments on: Primaries and disenfranchisement, Democrat and Republican

By: OBloodyhell

OBloodyhell — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 19:03:09 +0000

> The democrats only want a system that allows them to win. If that system fails they want another system. Power is all the care about even if it brings about the death of the nation.

Liberals, not Dems, but these days that IS, admittedly, a fine distinction:

“Professional liberals are too arrogant to compromise. In my experience, they were also very unpleasant people on a personal level. Behind their slogans about saving the world and sharing the wealth with the common man lurked a nasty hunger for power. They’d double-cross their own mothers to get it or keep it.”
– Harry S Truman, pp. 55, American Heritage 7/8 1992, from a 1970 interview —

By: OBloodyhell

OBloodyhell — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 18:51:56 +0000

> which would be anathema to those who think the selection of a nominee ought to reflect the pure popular will of the people.

What, you mean like those who think that the electoral college should be disposed of, and that Gore should’ve won in 2k?

LOL. Funny how such stuff only matters when people lose.

By: rafinlay

rafinlay — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 17:52:19 +0000

rwp&nnc: If we could accept that primaries belong to the parties, rather than the state, we could close the primaries by letting the parties allow voting for their candidates only if people registered with the party. Let the parties manage it, in other words. I am sure we are well beyond that. In fact, if I were a party boss in such a system, I would probably look for ways of restricting such membership to people I trust, which would lead back to greater state regulation. Never mind.

By: neo-neocon

neo-neocon — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 21:15:37 +0000

rightwingprof: I also think primaries should be closed—it makes no sense otherwise. But there’s no way to compel a state to do it.

By: rightwingprof

rightwingprof — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 20:34:42 +0000

Indeed, leave the EC alone and repeal the 17th. As for open primaries, there are a lot of people who are under the mistaken impression that all states are party registration states, and that is not true. There are quite a few states that have only registered voters, no registered Dems or Republicans. There is no way to “close” a primary if the state has no official party rolls.

By: njcommuter

njcommuter — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 12:54:29 +0000

I believe that even today Korea accepts the casting of lots when an electoral tie can’t be broken.

By: sergey

sergey — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 11:04:00 +0000

No election system is free of defects that can became meaningfull in some situations. In voting with preferences, for example, we can have situation when A is prefered to B, B is prefered to C, but C still is prefered to A! (This is known as Condorcet paradox.) Dusputes about relative advantages of proportional or majority system are also as old as the very practice of consensual government. In practice proportional system leads to many short-lived parties and unstable coalition governments incapable to achive any long-termed goals and often completely paralyzed, as in Italy or Israel. Such system works only there is a strong national leader, like Golda Meir or Berluscony, and in such periods hardly differ from personal authority, in Mussoliny style.
Perfect political system is impossible, and any legal regime is “injust” to somebody – or at least is percieved by some as such. The oldest republics, like Athens, Florence or Venice, used casting lots to select magistrates, and do it very often: their concept of fairness was accepting heavenly choice and frequient rotation, so nobody can stay in office too long to aquire undue influence.

By: Vince P

Vince P — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 08:32:39 +0000

I been on the Repeal the 17th Amend bandwagon for a few years now.

Also, Congress should use it’s Article III powers and restrict certain laws from Supreme Court review. Like laws regarding treatment of illegal combatants. And other types of laws where the courts keep overstepping their bounds.

By: rickl

rickl — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 07:04:32 +0000

1. Leave the Electoral College alone. The Founding Fathers knew what they were doing. The EC keeps the big cities from running the whole country. I think anyone with a functioning brain can envision how disastrous that would be. 2. Repeal the 17th Amendment. The Senate was supposed to represent the states' interests, not made up of winners of giant popularity contests. 3. Open primaries must be abolished. A common tactic in open primary states is to vote for the worst candidate of the opposing party, rather than the best candidate of one's own party. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that this has a tendency to lower the quality of the winning candidates from both parties. Whoever originated the idea of open primaries must have been an idiot or a traitor.

By: harry McHitlerburtonstein the Extremist

harry McHitlerburtonstein the Extremist — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 05:39:12 +0000

AVI:
harry, I took your point, and in the abstract it is a good one. When pressing it for juice, however, it doesn’t produce what you hoped.”

How is it you know what I had hoped? My only “juice” was a reminder of how swiftly some of the other “conservatives” on this blog where quick to plant the label of “extremism” upon values that I had always took to be mainstream and very basically conservative. The immigration issue definitely being one of them.

I think many people in the Republican party have been infected with Go-Along-to-Get-Along, syndrome which includes a secret desire to be appreciated by people on the left, or at least seen to be somewhat less inflexible, “purist”, “extremist” and therefore, really not such a bad sort of fellow in the eyes of your fellow Americans.

Maybe if you can seem to be “more reasonable” to the average Joe than us inflexible klansmen you can convince the undecided to vote for a 70 year old guy who is clearly willing to sell out in order to have a chance of beating the charismatic multi-cultural messiah. Perhaps it will work. I just dont think its the best way to get there.