Is It Me, Or Is The Primary Process Broken?

As in fewer and fewer primaries . . in open seats/offices. Maybe not completely broken, maybe weakened. Maybe I'm wrong, but even if I am, I really hate it when Dems are left with one Democrat to choose from. It's like the party decides and not the people. What I'm saying is, as a Democrat, I like having a choice.

Yet another x against them. When will he give me something to cheer for? Damn.

Any demonstration of that or just more Obama frustration?

"Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are amping up pressure on the White House to divulge details of Rep. Joe Sestak's allegation that the Obama administration offered him a federal job in exchange for dropping his primary challenge to Arlen Specter in Pennsylvania's race for Senate."

I do offer benefit of the doubt to anyone who has allegations leveled against them, even repukes, but I also have no reason to doubt Sestak's claim. So I am forced to remain neutral on this allegation until an investigation is made (it won't happen).

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/26/joe-sestak-white-house-jo_n_590815.html

:rofl:

This team of Chicago thugs (with Kenyan infiltrators) is forcing people out.

Check my post right above yours!

B-)

:silly:

They can definately be unfair. But that's politics!

government itself is broken.

Well, broken from this side of the economic iron curtain, at least. It is working well for those who matter most now in the culture, the winners, hands down, of the clandestine Class War.

"This is the party of Progressives, not old-school Democrats." -- DC rep. Tommy Wells, D-Capitol Hill, who got elected on a platform of closing down public schools and scattered-site public housing in order to cleanse the neighborhood of black people

That's the problem.

I cannot remember very many in my life time. We certainly have a number of candidates in Kansas - in both parties. About 7 are running as Republicans for the 3rd district. 5 are running as Democrats for the US Senate, and 3 for Congress in my district. That last race is happening, though, because the official, party-chosen candidate dropped out in January.

in Kansas Congressional races..Dist 1 has 6 (r), 1 (D), and 1 (L) this seat is currently Moran's seat (R), Dist 3 has 9 (R), 2 (D), 1 (L), and 1 (I), Dist 4 has 5 (R), 2 (D), 1 (I), and 1 reform. The 4th is my District. I don't see why there aren't more (D) candidates in that race. Glickman (D) held the seat for years. Raj Goyle (D) is the only really viable candidate and unless he gets his ass out of wichita and lets the rest of the District get to know who he is, he doesn't have a prayer which will, at best, leave us with Schodorf (rino) but more likely Wink Hartman (RRRRRRR). This is an important seat and it is angering to see nobody in the Dem party really fighting for it.

District 1 is unwinnable for Democrats so lots of candidates are not gonna try for that and in the other two districts there are very strong candidates. Why should a D try to take on Raj Goyle and his $800,000? Would that somehow make the race more winnable in the fall? Considering the size of his district, Raj has plenty of time to cover it. After all, I managed to visit 25 of the 27 counties in the 2nd district in just two months while still working part and full time. Raj is a rising star of the KDP, that was all they wanted to talk about at Washington Days. If you think he needs to get out of Wichita (and I think you are probably right in that assessment) then I suggest that you contact his campaign or the KDP. The other groups would be Vic at the Reno County democrats. After the primary they should co-ordinate with the Goyle campaign to create an event for him in Hutchinson. It's not all up to the candidates. Plus there is the State Fair and I thought the KDP was doing something for the State Fair.

fact, I remember when an elected representative had no challengers from either party for decades.

We got a conservative President based on a primary process ginned up to be controlled by a sparsely populated, rural, agrarian state. Why are we shocked that the candidate thus selected is a conservative?

making stuff up because it fits your theory?

The party threw a hissy fit when the pre-eminence of a conservative, rural, agrarian state which in no way mirrors the country was threatened.

The result of this process was to select a conservative President who in no way is in touch with the concerns with the country. Coincidence? I think not.

Not many other states have rural counties that vote for liberals.

"Not many other states have rural counties that vote for liberals."

"Liberals" like Barack Obama, you mean? :eyes:

:rofl:

Or is he the $7 million dollar yacht-owning tax dodgER?

My memory isn't so good. Is that the John Kerry to whom you refer? :hi:

That's about the extent of it.

For the record, he voted AGAINST the Iraq War Resolution. (I just looked it up.)

But who could tell?

I actually went to his website to see what his positions were on the various issues--and his positions were buried deep on the website in wonkish policy papers. What was visible on the website was a bunch of vague generalities, kind of like the two campaign speeches I heard him give in person in Minneapolis.

In retrospect, given Obama's record of making vague campaign speeches and caving into the Republicans at every opportunity, I have to wonder if marrying into money didn't quell a lot of Kerry's old liberalism.

"I have to wonder if marrying into money didn't quell a lot of Kerry's old liberalism."

Dorgan voted for the IWR and Bush's RW law protecting the unborn and he gets the populists label

Gore has been right of Kerry for most of his life, and he's was the progressive everyone wanted to run in 2008. Kerry was the lead author on the clean money bill constantly attributed to Wellstone, who assisted on the bill. Kerry voted against DOMA, something Wellstone didn't do, and he's considered a martyr among progressives.

If not for Kerry and his push to set a deadline in Iraq, there would never have been a push for it. The majority of Dems wanted to keep an open-ended commitment.

Kerry has one of the most liberal/progressive records among Senators. The fact that people hold up a vote here or there doesn't change that.

John Edwards, who was not a progressive in the Senate, coopted Kerry's 2004 platform and was hailed by some as the most progressive candidate in 2008.

I have too good a memory of him being a founding member of the DLC and advocating for the Contras.

I was so upset with the Dems for nominating Gore and for his inept campaign that I came within a couple of days of voting for Nader. Gore's ineptness and unwillingness to anything but say "me too" to Bush's assertions (I'm pro business. I'm for a strong defense. I'm for capital punishment.) made a contest that should have been a walkover into something that was close enough to steal.

A lot of people on this site have a touching, childlike faith that Gore wouldn't have gone into Iraq, etc. My view is that anyone who supported the Contras against a government that was no conceivable threat to the U.S. is an advocate of the "America as the world's policeman and enforcer of corporate interests" foreign policy. To my knowledge, Gore has never disavowed his former support of a brutal war that killed thousands of people who were just trying a different way to crawl out of poverty.

He was 100% wrong about NAFTA.

If you'd like to dig a hole in which to bury your head, be my guest. But the points I raise are well documented (Kerry even admitted his fault as to the taxes.) :hi:

You need to learn the facts before putting words in Kerry's mouth. From the Boston Globe



The "ketchup heiress" Teresa is not a resident of Mass. So when did the law change to make a Pittsburgh resident or company liable for Mass taxes? Everyone in the media, and I mean everyone, knows that Kerry and Teresa's finances are not one in the same. He friggin ran for President in 2004, his finances have been scrutinized more than only a handful of elected officials. In fact, most Americans who followed the 2004 elections closely should know this.

Without a broken primary system, the national party hacks cannot select winners and losers, and their power is gone ...

the corporate media anoint some candidates as "frontrunners" before a single vote is cast (based on the amount of corporate money they have raised) and ignore the rest.

Case in point--2008, when already in 2007, the corporate media were talking ONLY Obama and H. Clinton, as if they were the only two contenders. A lot of voters who get all their info from the MSM genuinely thought that there were no other candidates running. (BTW, that's one reason I knew that Obama wasn't the leftist that everyone seemed to think he was. The MSM would never actually promote a real leftist.)

And don't get me started on 2004. I've ranted about that several times already. There is nothing that will enlighten a person the corruption of the process like supporting a candidate who is subject to alternating media blackouts and ridicule before a single caucus/primary vote has been cast. (I was a Kucinich supporter, but the Dean supporters have their own complaints about how their candidate was portrayed.)

The primary system is RIGGED. Anyone who colors outside the DLC's lines will be either ignored or ridiculed in the MSM.

Watching the way the media manipulates perception of the candidates has been frustrating, to say the least.

The broken primary process actually ranks behind electronic voting fraud, and THAT gets zero attention...

is higher than the Poliburo's was.

There were 2 caucuses, 2 primaries, and the Florida and Michigan mess, before the slate of eight candidates was narrowed down to two on January 30th. Four states got to narrow the list down to two choices for the rest of us. Five months before I actually got to vote, since my primary was in late May, basically rendering my state's primary irrelevant. Irrelevant to me, even without the long wait, since I didn't want to nominate either of the two left standing.

And there's no real way around that problem.

It exhausts us, leaving us no energy to notice that Big Money has bought it.

File next to Bread, in the Circuses folder.

The corrupting influence of money in our system is destroying the country for all but the very well heeled.