Posted on 01/26/2009 7:13:00 PM PST by HogsBreath
Why would the Republican party weed out it's primary candidates in states that are going to vote Democrat? Iowa (Obama +15%) New Hampshire (Obama +10%) Shouldn't the Republican candidates be competing in Florida, Ohio, Indiana...as the primaries that will show us who should be the candidate?
Agreed. Primaries are an odd thing. I don’t like the winner take all nor do I like any where you can’t vote in them unless you are registered in that party. They should also be over a period of time so you can get a real feel for people though no more than 2 months.
No system is perfect but the one we have now is broken for sure.
I wish the primaries were much closer together. By the time it was my state’s turn to vote, it was all over. Have them in a week and don’t declare a winner until the last vote is counted.
Do them democrats vote in republican primaries in the states you list? Basically it should republicans voting in their primary unless it is an open situation.
In New Hampshire you do not even have to physically live in the state, all you have to do to register to vote on election day is say you PLAN to move there and so you want to vote there and they allow it... this was likely one reason Hillary did so well in NH, there was reports of a whole lot of MA license plates in the parking lots on primary day.
Forget it. The media determines these matters, to hell with the People who are such dumbasses that they allow these creeps control.
In order for the Republicans to win in 2012, New Hampshire and Iowa would have to be in play.
But there definitely has to be rule changes next time out for the Republicans to stand a chance- regardless of which states lead off in the selection process.
In 2012, the Democrat nominee is already decided. The crossover factor is more than likely to lead to another Republican liberal or “moderate” candidate and another defeat. In other words, McCain will probably be renominated.
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Strongly disagree. The Republican nominee should be selected only by Republicans--especially in 2012. President 0 will likely run unopposed, leaving DemonRat voters free to "cross over" and vote for a RINO or other weak Republican. Crossover voters gave us McCain.
The RNC should only seat 2012 delegates from states with "closed" Republican primaries. This gives us the best chance at fielding a strong--or at least viable--candidate.
ACK! Your last sentence actually made me gasp out loud.
LOL, that's like a really twisted, ghastly version of Groundhog Day, isn't it?
The only thing that'll save us from that nightmare scenario is that by then he'll be too old & tired & confused & he won't have the fire in his belly to do what it takes to win.
Oh, wait....
Personally, I think the primary system ought to be scrapped completely. Let each county party in every state decided it’s choice of candidate (proportional to number of registered Republicans in the county), and the aggregate results decide the nominee. And this all goes on in a single day.
Barring this, I say close the primaries to Republicans only. NOBODY WHO IS NOT A REPUBLICAN should have a say in deciding the GOP candidate. NOBODY. And again, have the elections be held on the same day, nationwide. Any state party that doesn’t get on board with that has its delegates decertified.
Something definitely needs to change with how we do our primaries. I am in Ohio and by the time we had our primary, McCain was pretty much the only candidate. Everyone else had either dropped out or announced they were dropping out after our primary. There were still several primaries later than ours. All states need to be given equal opportunity to vote for all the contenders in the race.
this was likely one reason Hillary did so well in NH,
Again does that impact the Republican Primary, the topic of this thread? I just don’t see people crossing over that much to vote republican, but then maybe they do.
Well put. That exact sentiment is why I started this thread.
yeah. That’s what I meant. Perhaps I stated it poorly. Only Republicans should vote in Republican primaries. That’s why I said you can’t vote in them unless you are registered in that party.
We’re on the same page. =)
That's not to say that the primary system doesn't need major reform. It does and it is coming. Just realize that whatever we do has long term ramifications. Closed primaries also close some doors.
My idea is to change the order of the primaries every 2 years. The order would be based on the outcome of the previous presidential election. The state where the Republican got the greatest percentage of the vote would go first followed by the others in order.
This way the most conservative states would have a chance to give thier preferred candidate a leg up on the others.
Closed primaries are a necessity.
If NH had been a GOP-only primary I strongly doubt the winner would have been John McCain and, as a result, I doubt he would have won the nomination.
If NH had been a GOP-only primary I strongly doubt the winner would have been John McCain and, as a result, I doubt he would have won the nomination.
McCain had the organization, put the hours in NH that others didn’t, and I doubt the winner would have been any different if it had been a closed primary.
Democrats will just switch parties, vote for a Republican in the 2012 primaries and vote for Obama in November 2012.
It is legal to switch parties.
It is legal to vote for anyone you want in November.
Until those 2 things change, there is nothing we can do to stop Democrats from voting in Republican primaries.
National primary or a couple super Tuesdays where the states are rotated each election. If you keep it the way it is, the whigs are going to keep picking dud candidates.
The open primary is what gives us duds like McCain.
Closed Primaries are absolutely required if we are going to have a even playing field with RINOs.
They may not be perfect but they are better than Open Primaries, which are just a nightmare for corruption.
This is the quiet issue that is more important than some policy issues...and this is where the RINO attorneys work behind the scenes to coopt conservative influence.
The current "mash all the primaries into January following two years of content-free sound-bite fests masquerading as debates that nobody gets to see" system is a complete failure.
If the R's were smart, they would expend some effort identifying and actively recruiting good and viable candidates -- a combo of the old "smokey back room" approach, with the apparently necessary evil of modern-day primaries.
Beyond that, they've got to reform the allocation of delegates.... like, maybe, putting the small states first and the big states last, so that the delegate selection process has to last into June before a candidate can possibly be chosen.
I heard Bob Dole is thinking of running again... 8^)
But that's precisely the problem ... if you mash them all into one week, you encourage the candidates to go for style over substance. It's a great way to pick terrible candidates, with no time to assess their relative qualities over time.
I would much prefer that the primary season be stretched out significantly, with the order being selected such that it's impossible to gain a majority of delegates before June.
The weak sisters would drop out as the early primaries came out badly for them; and by June you'd be left with the truly viable candidates.
If one could somehow inject real debates into the process, on real issues, that would be swell, too. The real red-meat debates would begin in May, once all of the poor candidates had left the stage.
That's a good plan, which I would modify by ensuring that the delegate count couldn't result in a majority until very late in the primary season.
I don’t believe McCain was picked by Dems trying to sabotage the election. I think he was picked by Republicans playing the “electable” game. The sad fact of the matter is that no one sold the message of small government effectively. You can make people sign an oath that they swear to vote GOP in November and you’ll still get the same candidates if there isn’t a candidate who can sell the message effectively.
I've proposed a similar concept, except that instead of raw percentage of vote, it would be based on net gain of vote share from the previous election. I.e., states trending more Republican would get more early "say" than states trending less Republican.
I would also suggest some sort of formula apply so that there's also some guarantee of a mix of small, medium, and large states as well as geographic spread.
So you’re saying the big crossover of party re-registrations here in PA didn’t make a difference?
Sorry, but the combination of open primaries and media interference did make a difference. At least here in PA it did,IMHO.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.
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