Nov 2023 Mod notice:
There may be other, more specific, threads about some aspects of US politics, but this one tends to act as a hub for all sorts of related news and information, so it's usually one of the busiest OTC threads.
If you're new to OTC, it's worth reading the Introduction to On-Topic Conversations
and the On-Topic Conversations debate guidelines
before posting here.
Rumor-based, fear-mongering and/or inflammatory statements that damage the quality of the thread will be thumped. Off-topic posts will also be thumped. Repeat offenders may be suspended.
If time spent moderating this thread remains a distraction from moderation of the wiki itself, the thread will need to be locked. We want to avoid that, so please follow the forum rules
when posting here.
In line with the general forum rules, 'gravedancing' is prohibited here. If you're celebrating someone's death or hoping that they die, your post will get thumped. This rule applies regardless of what the person you're discussing has said or done.
Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
If you can't prove it's hard to actual register for a party than your point falls apart. As are as I know, there's nothing stopping someone from registering for one, voting, and then opting out if they want.
That being said, it really shouldn't be that hard to understand why only wanting people in the party to vote on it's nomination is a thing.
Nope.
Thad Cochran in Missisippi won his renomination in 2014 in large parts thanks to Democrats voting in the Republican primary, where he had been primaried for being too moderate. Without their support he would probably have lost.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard FeynmanFine, I concede this particular point*, but the fact remains that our overall political system is designed in a way which causes it to alternate between obscenely undemocratic or obscenely rigid (depending on the political situation at the time) for no readily apparent reason other than maintaining the power of the political elite.
* At least insofar as fifth column voters can be a problem. Though I have a feeling that primary was one that allowed voters to vote in both of the primaries, which I would agree is a bad idea; you should have to pick between one or the other.
edited 15th May '16 12:40:19 PM by CaptainCapsase
Granted: There is no adequate reason why all citizens should not be automatically registered to vote as soon they reach voting age. There is also no adequate reason why changing one's affiliation prior to a primary should be a difficult process. However, it is disingenuous to claim the outcome of the primary election as illegitimate merely because the guy you like lost, when the rules were known in advance to all parties.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"The motives of independents are always suspect, and if they don't want to call themselves Democrats, they have no business being involved in a Democratic primary. If they have already refused to affiliate, they obviously do not agree with the party platform, and therefore I wonder how much an attempt at electoral subversion factors into their motives.
edited 15th May '16 1:39:21 PM by CrimsonZephyr
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."
The democrats have no business having a monopoly on "left" wing politics in the United States either; the reason there's so many unaffiliated voters in the United States is the fact that our system by design makes it more or less impossible to have more than two parties, meaning a very large portion of the political spectrum is effectively disenfranchised.
edited 15th May '16 1:42:04 PM by CaptainCapsase
Having dozens of viable parties won't help anything, and it results in catastrophe for the left, which needs an iron fist guiding it to electoral success. They're not fucking disenfranchised — their oddball views and candidates don't have mass appeal, or, for that matter, not enough mass appeal to produce a decisive victory. We need to fucking win, not hold the hand of every insurgent leftist who's more interested in quarreling.
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."
Yes, in a country where the "center" is vaguely center-left. In a country where the conservatives are mostly just upper-class rich twits, rather than corporate sociopaths and religious nut jobs. In a country that isn't a culture war tinderbox. A country where there aren't generational implications for every election liberals lose. In America, where one half of the political spectrum is just pure cancer, it's a laughable conceit to even suggest that the solution to all our problems is to fragment the Left into multiple parties. Do you want the Republicans to win every election ever, or something? Because your opinion just seems really divorced from reality.
edited 15th May '16 1:54:45 PM by CrimsonZephyr
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."![]()
Which is why all of the European nations using parliamentary systems are run by right wing ultraconservatives, amirite? You're reversing the cause and effect, I'm afraid; America's backwards political system is precisely why our left is so easily fragmented compared to the right.
Yes, but not enough o consider the party agreeable, otherwise they'd be registered as such.
edited 15th May '16 1:55:36 PM by CaptainCapsase
They're already involved, they're paying for it after all.
Now personally I think that that's what has to change, the public needs to stop paying for the Democrat and Republican primaries, because they should be private organisations doing it themselves.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran"Which is why all of the European nations using parliamentary systems are run by right wing ultraconservatives, amirite?"
The political spectrum in Europe is way different than in America. Don't keep looking to Europe. That's a losing proposition. We'll never be like them, not in our lifetimes.
" Yes, but not enough o consider the party agreeable, otherwise they'd be registered as such."
I don't think it's a political disagreement, but a cultural aversion to collective affiliation. Americans are leery of anything that forces them to adopt a label, which, in my opinion, is patently ridiculous.
edited 15th May '16 1:57:31 PM by CrimsonZephyr
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.""You're reversing the cause and effect, I'm afraid; America's backwards political system is precisely why our left is so easily fragmented compared to the right."
Our "backwards political system" is the only reason the American left has any victories to call their own at all.
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."The gridlock we're currently experiencing doesn't come from the two parties having different policy positions, it's from one party labelling anything supported by the other axiomatically bad and fighting it tooth and nail, regardless of the bridges they're burning by doing so. That's a new think that, in a nutshell, comes from the dixiecrat wing of the Republican party (which the Republicans rely on for votes, but have been doing nothing to actually appease for quite some time) rebelling against the party leadership and demanding a "no moderation, no compromise" approach to governance.
What will happen is that they'll continue to accomplish nothing except obstructionism, which will continue to drive away everyone else from their position, and they'll eventually make themselves irrelevant as the entire rest of the electorate unites against them. The only question is how long this process will take. Will the movement dissolve after Trump crashes and burns? Will they struggle on afterwards? On the extreme end, they could concievably drag the entire Republican party down with them, agitating until the Democrats become so dominant that they fracture under their own weight and we end up with two new parties: a leftist party (ie, Bernie and his supporters) and a center-left party (ie, Clinton and her supporters) instead of a center-left and far right (Obama vs Tea Party) or a center-left vs center-right (traditional Democrats vs traditional Republicans).
That said, I'm not saying I think the two-party system is the best way to do things. I'd love to see more parties that work together in broader coalitions, rather than the big-tent stuff we have now. It would allow more granularity in politics — the progressive leftists could work together with libertarians on social issues and the religious right on economic issues, instead of both of the latter being Republicans and therefore having to toe the party line against the Democratic progressives, for example. But in order to do that, we'd have to change our voting system away from first past the post — which there's essentially no political will to do, so it ain't happening any time soon.
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.![]()
Platforms are, but policy has been fairly centrist at best.
The extreme polarization of modern American politics is fairly recent, was initially confined to the bases of the parties rather than its leadership, its spread into a large portion of the GOP's leadership, hence the deadlock only emerging during Obama's presidency.
edited 15th May '16 2:06:43 PM by CaptainCapsase

It prevents members of the opposing party from gaming your candidate selection. It's been done a few times in the past.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman