My good friend Stefan and I agree on very little, but we have equal disdain for the dumb-ass Top-Two primary. This is a rare issue that crosses party lines, which I suppose explains why both major parties are suing to have I-872 tossed out.
Another example of this curious bipartisanship is today’s guest blog on Northwest Progressive Institute, by Dr. Reed Davis, a former chair of the King County GOP, and the runner-up in last September’s Republican primary for US Senate. Dr. Davis is also an Associate Professor of Political Science at Seattle Pacific University, and he presents a very cogent defense of political parties, and their partisan primaries.
Davis provides the quote of the day: “I have been chagrined to discover that asking the good voters of Washington State whether they prefer the Republican or the Democratic Party is a bit like asking them who their favorite Menendez brother is.”
Reed Davis sayt that “as grassroots party organizations atrophy, politics becomes more professionalized and, for that reason, more expensive. . . . Perhaps the single most dismal fact of modern campaigns and elections is this: the single best predictor of political victory is money. Period. There isn’t even a close second.”
I think he’s half-right; but it’s really the other way around. As politics become more professionalized and far more expensive, grassroots party organizations (which aren’t the source of huge fundraising dollars) atrophy.
Reed also points out that “in order to avoid the possibility of members of the same party running against one another in the general election, both the King County Republicans and the King County Democrats (as well as county organizations for both parties statewide) have met in order to nominate just one candidate for the general election.
That not only preserves voter choice for the general election, it strengthens local parties: now a good candidate is someone who is capable of mobilizing, organizing and appealing to the greatest number of real live people, not someone who is simply capable of raising the most amount of money.”
Um, so if this is a consequence of the Top Two primary, tell me again what the problem is?
The Top Two primary is already working just like it should: grassroots party organizations choose their representative (via a convention or caucus, at their own expense), and the people of the state get to choose among them (and candidates not endorsed by any party); and then there’s a runoff between the two most popular candidates. Works for me.
Davis has some interesting points. Part of what Davis is saying is that political parties provide information about candidates and that information is power. But this perspective is dated. For example, this quote:
What voter doesn’t flinch when Dick Morris extols the internet as the future of political communication, or when political consultant Robert Squier declares that “The television set has become the political party of the future”?
If information is power and the internet broadly distributes information, then political power will become more widely distributed at the grassroots level. It will allow fundraising to occur on a more distributed model. The issue will become how to harness that power so that it doesn’t become chaotic and destructive. Perhaps that will be the role that political parties will play in the future–a distribution channel for political energy that is mobilized at the grass roots–rather than the top down hierarchy that exists today.
Top Two — Top Too!
It is likely that voter turnout for nonpartisan elections is lower than it is for partisan ones for the simple reason that voters simply don’t know enough about individual candidates to cast what they feel is a responsible vote.
So, let me get this straight, we need parties cause folks are too lazy to actually do their duty as Americans. The nice parties will come along and tell us what to think? I am not sure I would call that a cogent defense of political parties.
I have said it before and I will say it again. Political parties are not any part of our constitution, and caucuses, primaries, etc should never be paid for at public expense.
I’ll agree with you Bill that I don’t like the idea of large political entities being subsidised. I don’t like agendas to the far right or the far left, both parties are inherently bad when brought to their full potential.
I told people when the US first went into iraq that they were our scapegoat for the bombings as well as a Bush family vendetta. On the other side of the coin I saw right through Clinton and his foreign campain contribututions (China), and their returns through nuclear secrets and a “most favored trading partner” status.
Truth is that until we start trying both sides for their treasonous acts, they will both continue to deficate on our rights and freedom.
Remember these remarks next time before you accuse me of reading out of the “neo-con” handbook.
I don’t think parties are “inherently bad.” At their best, they help people come together to advance a common agenda. At their worst, they protect their own at the expense of the public.
this is a JEWEL of a read:
http://www.americanthinker.com.....le_id=4578
then there is this beauty: My favorite!
http://www.americanthinker.com.....le_id=4587
democrats on crack, up your crack and botox crack. I LOVE IT!!
democrats, republicans, libertarians and any other party: Hold your local caucus, have your damn convention. Just don’t spend a dime of tax payer money to do it. Save the state and counties the cost of the primary election. With rare exception, there is very little debate or campaigning for the primary any way. Usually there is the “party annointed candidate” and maybe a few pesky challengers who don’t stand a chance.
People would take the primary seriously if there was meaningful and thoughtful debate about ideas and policy. But it quickly digresses into a debacle consisting of mud slinging and leveling of accusations. When the elected officials get to Olympia, the vast majority participate in polarized partisan politics, where the d and r mean more than common sense or logic.
I’m an independent voter because I’m disgusted by the parties and the childish and petty partisan politics that have taken the leadership, common sense and logic right out of government in this state. To be honest, I’m thankful for the opportunity to have a non-partisan ballot in the primary. One more time I don’t have to agonize over which undesirable candidate is the lesser of evils. Fight it out amongst yourselves. The names may change, the result – broken promises, lies, and stagnant, inefficient government – remains the same.
Well, bitter-grape, you’re bullshit apple sure doesn’t fall far from your bullshit tree. True to your roots all righty! That Baehr…he’s CRAPtacular!
Ooh ooh ooh ooh…I’m a lefty and I hate Isreal…Ooh ooh oogga booga (c’mon fellow traveler comrades…you know the words…it’s from our super duper secret lefty songbook C’MON!!!)Ooh ooh ooh ooh…I’m a lefty and I hate Isreal…Ooh ooh oogga booga (c’mon guys! conga line..let’s go!)
dipshit.
Chard-
Whats so great about single sided, propaganda-spewing bullshit? However, if this is your idea of quality reading, it CERTANTLY explains volumes about you.
Just remember, theres only ONE side to a story…and that side is always right!
democrats, republicans, libertarians and any other party: Hold your local caucus, have your damn convention. Just don’t spend a dime of tax payer money to do it. Save the state and counties the cost of the primary election.
I couldnt agree more Darren.. The republican should pay for there own primary and only republicans should be able to vote in the republican primary.
Political parties are the only institution in our society with the ability and resources to develop policy positions, recruit candidates, train campaign workers, and deploy large numbers of campaign volunteers. No individual could do what parties do.
I don’t understand why anyone would support a primary system that keeps third-party and independent candidates off the general election ballot. The top two system means you will never be able to vote for anyone except the party-anointed Democrat and Republican candidates.
brain DamageD @ 12
here is what’s right,
YOUR Star Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton was a long-time board member of Wal Mart-the bete noir of liberals.
Howard Dean is the Park Avenue triplex-raised, private-school-educated beneficiary of the Dean Witter fortune.
John Corzine of Goldman Sachs, Herb Khol “Khols Dept Stores” , Jay Rockefeller, Frank Lautenberg ADP (outsourced), Mark “Target” Dayton, all trust fund babys or owned BIG corporations.
Chard –
I see you’ve figured how to use the cut and paste function of your computer.
Now it’s time you begin thinking for your self and quit coping other peoples work. Those are NOT your words…WE ALL KNOW you don’t have the cranial capacity to write using multi-syllable words, non-rednek languages and creative plays on names.
If your going to use other peoples work, at least use quotes…these little things “”, or credit the TRUE author. It just makes you look like a thief and a cheat…
That’s what RIGHT is…
White Whiner, show me a GOP leader who isn’t rich. Show me a Bush cabinet member who isn’t corporate-connected. What’s your fucking point? That rich people run this country, regardless of political party? Tell us something we don’t already know.
Yeah Chard– stop cutting and pasting the truth from other web sites. What you post maybe the truth but if your getting that truth through a lie.. well that aint all that truthful.
Chard, let me correct one of the errors in the Lasky article you’re drooling over … the Dean Witter canard. While Howard Dean was indeed raised on Park Avenue and a prep-school/Yale graduate (not unlike a certain faux-cornpone rich preppie occupying 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue), his family’s only connection with “the Dean of Dean Witter” is that his father was a highly-placed employee of the firm.
With respect to Mr. Witter, Dean was simply the gentleman’s first name. Nothing more, nothing less. But don’t take my word for it, just read about it.
It’s understandable that you’d be confused in this way about Dean’s background. After all, you’re in good company. From the September 19,2003 issue of the Socialist Worker:
Correction and clarification
SOCIALIST WORKER incorrectly reported that the “Dean” in the Wall Street Investment firm Dean Witter came from Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean’s family. In fact, the “Dean” came from the firm’s co-founder Dean Witter–first name Dean, last name Witter.
According to the New York Times, the wrong story was first put out by a “senior adviser to a Dean rival [who] sent an e-mail message saying, ‘You do know that he is the Dean of Dean Witter, don’t you?’” However, Howard Dean’s father was the head of stock trading for Dean Witter.
And the Deans are part of the old-money crowd that you’d expect to have their name attached to Wall Street firms. “Dean is about as WASP as you can get,” columnist Jimmy Breslin wrote in New York Newsday. “He is out of East Hampton, the part of it where money comes out of the safe with a light coating of dust.”
Animal Farm in the making.
@ 18
Do I sense sarcasm?
Goldy, you seem to have problems with the will of the majority of the people. Didnt we just vote on this very issue?
Who Killed You @ 14:
“I don’t understand why anyone would support a primary system that keeps third-party and independent candidates off the general election ballot. The top two system means you will never be able to vote for anyone except the party-anointed Democrat and Republican candidates.”
Poppycock. The top two system gives every candidate an even chance to advance to the general election. If third-party and independent candidates don’t offer a message or a candidate that appeals to enough people, they aren’t going to make the runoff. Tough. By guaranteeing a one-on-one runoff, the Top Two primary ensures that the winner will be chosen by a majority (not just a plurality) of the voters.
Oh my God, I agree with Chuck. The world is ending or something.
22
Oh bullshit. What makes two a magic number? Why not three? Or four? Or the top five?
Let’s go back to 1992, when Perot got 20% of the vote. Perot was a clown, a dilletante, a gadfly. Yet he got 20% of the vote. Why? Because a substantial portion of the electorate felt the two major parties didn’t represent them. The Democratic and Republican parties were, in the eyes of these voters, dysfunctional. They were given a choice between Bush Sr. and Clinton, and threw up their hands, and said “neither of the above,” and cast a protest vote. Perot didn’t get close to being elected, but the protest voters sent a message to the two majors that they were doing a poor job of representing the citizens of this country, and it had an impact.
It sounds to me like you want to create an entitlement for the Democratic and Republican parties. And take away other choices from the voters. How do you justify that? That isn’t democracy. Giving the two biggest parties a monopoly over the General Election ballot will serve us no better than any other monopoly. How many times have third-party reform movements been appropriated by the major parties? Over and over again. The second-string parties may never elect anyone but throughout our history they have often been the source of new movements and ideas that reshaped the major parties. If you eliminate these lesser parties from the ballot, you end up with the old phone company monopoly:
“We don’t care, because we don’t have to.”
R.R., how is the Top Two primary an entitlement for the Dems and Rethugs? Or are you just resigned to believing no third-party candidate could ever come out of the primary in 1st or 2nd place? This state isn’t so party-loyalist. Give us a great Green or Libertarian or Independent candidate, and we’ll vote for him or her. And if we don’t, then the voters have no one to blame for ‘taking away that choice’ but themselves.
Third-party and independent candidates will still have every opportunity to shape the debate and put forth new ideas—until they’re put to a test in the primary. (And afterward, if a minority candidate had a significant percentage of the vote, you can bet that the two surviving candidates will be trying to attract those voters, along with the eliminated candidate’s endorsement.)
The new primary is almost the same as our general elections were before; but now we’ll have a runoff of the two most popular candidates. No spoilers (e.g., no votes for Buchanan costing Gore the Presidency), no thrown-away or vanity votes (and no wondering whether the Bennett voters would have supported Rossi or Gregoire), no one elected with a minority of the vote (a la Clinton ’92).
Hey David….you don’t seem to have all the info on this system. I suggest you take a look at these pages which provide some very useful information about the problems with “Top Two”.
Why should we care that I-872 (the new “top two” system) eliminated third party candidates, minor party candidates and independents?
In 2000, 180,000 voters in this state cast their ballots for third party candidates. That’s 180,000 voices whose message would never be heard by our government if I-872 passed. That’s 180,000 voters drawing our attention to different ideas and different approaches that will be lost if I-872 passes. In today’s difficult world, can we really afford to isolate our elected officials from competition and different ideas? One of the most important aspects of our system of government is its “check and balance” approach. Third-party candidates, minor party candidates and independent candidates are an important part of that check and balance.
I-872 created a Louisiana-style primary that sharply reduced your choices in general elections. Over a third of the statewide and congressional candidates who appeared on the general election ballot in 2000 would have been eliminated in the primary if I-872 had been the law then. Now it is the law.
No David, the General Election won’t be “almost the same” as before. There will be only two names on the ballot, and they will always be R and D. Don’t you think that will drive some people away from voting, and leave others frustrated and angry? Why is this necessary? What purpose does it serve? What is so magical about the number two? Why? why? why? should we do it this way? The question cries out for an answer. There is no answer. It’s stupid and undemocratic.
Roger Rabbit @ 30: Read more carefully. I did not say that the general election will be almost the same as before. I said that “The new primary is almost the same as our general elections were before; but now we’ll have a runoff of the two most popular candidates.”
Thanks for the link, M.O.H.; good stuff there. I think some of the “problems” with the Top Two primary aren’t as bad as they’re made out to be, though. It seems like most of the dissatisfaction with the new system is related to the fact that there will be fewer choices on the general election ballot. I understand why that upsets a lot of people. I just wish more people would realize that the primary election is much more important now. That’s when a lot of the really fun action (including all the third-party candidates) is going to happen.
People used to blow off the primary because usually it didn’t make much difference, choosing between like candidates (obviously there were exceptions). Now the primary is going to make a big difference and I think more people will be more interested—which means more voter participation. It’s a paradigm shift, and I think it’s a good one.
If voter interest and turnout for this fall’s primary isn’t better than usual for an off-year, then my theory is wrong and I’ll agree with you that we should try something else. (General election IRV, anyone?)
31
Okay, your point is correct, but what you’re basically saying is turn the primary into a general election and turn the g.e. into a runoff. I don’t like that idea. I’d rather do this: If the parties are going to nominate their own candidates, eliminate the now-useless primary and let 3rd parties and independents run on the g.e. ballot. Turnouts are always lower for primaries, and runoffs serve no useful purpose in my opinion. Keep the general election in November and junk the September primary.