posted
It is lame, and it's not unique to either party.
i think the problem here is the election laws - it shouldn't be allowed for any election to shut out voters from the other party - (excepting primaries) The write-in deal needs to be eliminated as an exception.
Posts: 278 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
Shouldn't the Republican party be able to decide who represents it in a partisan election? Democrats shouldn't be able evade the fact that they don't have a viable canidate by voting in the Republican primary. Otherwise why not just make all primaries open?
Posts: 3446 | Registered: Jul 2002
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posted
The answer is gerrymandering. Many districts are drawn such that candidates from another party have almost no chance of winning.
Open primaries and elections at least give voters from independent and opposition parties a chance to have some say in the running of their district/county.
posted
I think Gerrymandering is a separate issue, and this is a whole county isn't it? Florida as a whole is pretty badly gerrymanderd, or at least South Florida which is the fault of the liberals .
Posts: 3446 | Registered: Jul 2002
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posted
Phanto, I think I would rather put my head through a meat grinder, bake a pie from the remains, and stuff it into my headless corpse, rather than to listen to another political ad or surly political discussion.
Posts: 2919 | Registered: Aug 2004
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posted
Me and you both, Sara and Phanto. Or rather, me and you three.
I've had it with all things political, I don't even want to listen to my family when they bring it up. My mother called to ask if I'd heard a part of the Republican convention and I said no and I didn't want to hear about it either.
Maybe that's not a healthy attitude but I just can't stand it anymore.
Posts: 278 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
Gerrymandering is not a seperate issue as it is representative of the kind of bs that is done to make certain parties, that is, ideals, weak within certain areas and to virtually guarantee success for one party, that is one set of beliefs.
I don't know the whole story behind why Dems are such a weak force in Lake Co, but they are. But let's ignore the Dems and just look at it in terms of the larger issue of having a say in who is in office where you live, as an majority vs. minority issue. What about Libertarians and Constitutionalists and Green party members? Their ideals and beliefs are being screwed over, too.
You think that if people from these other parties just put their ideas out and marketed them, then if the ideas have merit, they will eventually gain some power. I don't think this is necessarily always true. Squicky and I had a conversation about this issue once before and i took the side you are taking, NFL,but I also agreed that just as people could change their minds over time and choose what was best for them, there were also forces at work to keep things consistent and not change. This is done not only on the battlefield of ideas, but through shite like the links I outlined above.
People in positions of power like superintendent of schools can see to it that only certain ideas are taught to children at school. People in positions of political power can setup a power base, a political machine, which almost guarantees that no other group will ever wrest control from that group. This goes back to the issue of political parties that I was talking about in another thread.
This is why Florida has a law that if only one party is represented in a primary, people who are registered in other parties can vote in that primary. I agree with you, it dilutes the power of the party. This isn't good. However, I think it's a greater evil to marginilize people from other parties completely in the political process.
Even if you don't agree with the above, surely you agree that having your daughter write herself into a position, strictly to prevent people from other parties from voting, is unethical when that person isn't a member of that party and isn't even planning on running?
posted
I think the answer is to have certain positions be unaffiliated. Some already are, that list needs to be widend. If you let the Dems vote in the GOP primary then you violated the GOP's right to choose their canidate. If you don't let them vote, you violate their right to have a real say in the election. Either way you're screwing someone.
Posts: 3446 | Registered: Jul 2002
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posted
Maybe a little off topic, but I overheard someone the other day arguing that we don't pick candidates anymore by parties but by primaries. Parties meaning the smoke filled room image.
Is that where the work Party came from? Literally a party where movers and shakers came to hang out and pick who will run?
Posts: 4953 | Registered: Jan 2004
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posted
If you mean did people not vote for delegates who then vote like the Electoral College but instead delegates actually made the choice themselves, yes.
Posts: 3446 | Registered: Jul 2002
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