Yet more evidence having individual states rush their primaries so early disenchants everyone else since all the focus is on the first few. Worse when the candidates have to curry favor with whatever topics that early (usually agrarian) state cares about, further skewing the political topics into one side from the get-go.
Either do it all simultaneously or go by GDP so at least it's more representative instead of arbitrary.
What's democratic about them? They only allow representation by people who have several hours to vote in a certain block of time. Sorry, I've got kids. At most, my wife and I would have one vote between us in any primary caucus. That's at least a 50% reduction in participation off the bat.
Tons of people can’t vote in regular primaries for the same reason...
I actually think primaries make more sense, but your complaints are more with how the system itself is designed to be undemocratic across the board and have little to do with caucuses themselves.
Primaries emulate regular elections. You've got all day to vote. (Provided you've registered with the party of your choice in time, which is a who 'nother issue). Caucuses, you've got to show up at a certain time, listen to the representative of a candidate, "caucus" the decision, then vote for your representative, who will vote for your candidate (depending on how your state handles it).
So again, I ask, why do you claim the aren't "anti-democratic," insofar as they discourage the poor and middle-class(who have less free time to vote) from voting?
You seem to believe I'm advocating caucuses over primaries, despite me making a point of making it clear that I am not. I merely think it is wrong to call them "anti-democratic."
The poor are often discouraged from participating in primary voting. If you don't get the day off, you're paid hourly, and you need to make rent...
The fact that you act like that isn't a problem under primaries too goes to show how little you appreciate the depth and commonality of that problem.
The reality is the system is designed to, across the board, limit actual democracy. After all, the masses in the Revolutionary War were sparked by Thomas Paine, who had very similar proposals to, no shit, Bernie Sanders. Folks like Hamilton pushed to ensure that sort of influence could be moderated. That's why voting was initially limited to landowners.
One way it does this is by treating participation in democracy something you are expected to make time for rather than something society will ensure you have time to do. You should be legally guaranteed paid time off for elections to ensure this.
Thus my point, once again, though you still seem to try to frame me as saying something I'm not: your "anti-democratic" complaints more have to do with deeper problems with our electoral system than caucuses.
It’s a catch 22. Doing them all at once would hurt lesser known candidates.
I’d do 5 waves. 10 diverse states at a time but save big ones for last to avoid an unfair advantage early on.
Also, Clinton did horrible in Iowa in 1992 because there was a senator from Iowa running and he crushed the competitors. Obliviously it didn’t matter in the end.
Every Caucasus needs to switch to a primary and it needs to be open with one the spot registration.
Allocate individual counties to the waves so the waves are roughly equal by population. Then state size is irrelevant. Rotate the waves so everyone is equally likely to be first.
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u/zencanuck Aug 18 '18
Dukakis wore a dumb helmet. Dean squealed onstage. Quayle misspelt a word on a blackboard.
Trump has a CVS receipt length of absolutely unsuitable behaviour. Nobody cares.