If you are from Colorado or another SUPER TUESDAY state,from either party,please do your civic duty and vote/caucus.This may be the most important election of our lifetimes,really,don't blow it off!!IF you are a registered voter get down there.
i tried, but was told that i wasn't allowed to vote in the caucus. it seems that i needed to register, with my party, way back in late november or early december. i thought i was registered already. i have voted in every election here in colorado since i moved here 8 years ago.
i didn't vote in the caucus for the last presidential election, because john kerry and bush already had it wrapped up when the colorado caucus came around. actually i have never voted in a primary, or caucus, in any state that i lived in because it has always been a moot point.
it doesn't really seem fair that the states that have the early caucuses, and primaries are the ones who decide who gets the nomination. do iowa and new hampshire really represent the views of the nation as a whole? i really think that caucuses and primaries should all be held on the same day.
RHM wrote: it doesn't really seem fair that the states that have the early caucuses, and primaries are the ones who decide who gets the nomination. do iowa and new hampshire really represent the views of the nation as a whole? i really think that caucuses and primaries should all be held on the same day.
Here are a few reasons that some people like having the caucuses spread out: 1. It gives people more time to find out about the candidates. 2. It thins the field over time allowing voters to spend more time getting to know the front runners. 3. It also places more scrutiny on the front runners as the race develops which makes it easier to vet them and see how the perform under the spotlight, both of which will be key in the Nov. elections.
Personally I favor having caucuses spread out over time. I don't like that New Hampshire and Iowa get to be the first states each year. I think that the first caucuses should rotate to different states each election cycle.
It is surreal to be in Iowa during the lead up to voting. My grandma lives in a town of maybe 5,000. Former President Clinton came to speak at the YMCA, he stayed after and shook hands and posed for pictures with anyone who stayed. Sen. Obama was two towns away going door to door talking to voters.
I'm with you rhm. I think the nomination process and the caucuses are part of an antiquated system that may have once made some sense, but certainly doesn't any longer.
I went to my caucus for the first time, since it's the first time Colorado has been able to cast a vote that mattered. The whole thing was a clusterfuck from the start. Apparently everybody, except the organizers, realized there was going to be a massive turnout this year. They were prepared for around a max of a few hundred people and instead got 1400. For most people, the process went something like this:
-try to arrive early, but instead wait in a traffic jam for 45 minutes.
-try to park anywhere you can jam your car
-wait outside in the freezing cold for half an hour
-wait inside for another half hour
-get shuffled around as people try to figure out various overflow arrangements and how to communicate information.
Others didn't make it inside at all. At some point the doors were closed and those still waiting outside were turned away. They no doubt went home angry and disenfranchised.
Once started, my precinct pretty much just took a straight up vote and that was the final vote. We had 17 Obama, 14 Clinton, 1 Edwards (??), and 1 abstained (??). Nobody was interested in changing their vote. It was actually a tough process just to get people in a decent enough space to hear what was going on and count the votes.
That amounted to 2 delegates for Obama and 2 for Clinton. So essentially the vote was diluted by making each precinct a voting block. Does this make any sense? Absolutely not. It may have once made a little sense when your precinct was a few neighbors on a farm and maybe had some special interest in the area, but now days, there's not anymore reason for my corner of the neighborhood to be a voting block than for the entire front range to be a voting block. There is no real time in the caucus to have a meaningful debate. We live in such an information rich world, that arrangements like this simply no longer apply.
Sometimes it's amazing to me how poorly these very important democrat processes adapt. As far as I'm concerned the whole party nomination process is about a century behind the times.
Nominations should be done through a normal ballot election. This will allow more people to participate and with much less hassle. And yes, it's also totally illogical to continue to give more importance to some states over others - even to the point that some states have no vote at all. Then a state like Florida tries to move up their election date so they have more votes and their delegates are disqualified.
Honestly, we're the country trying to export our great system of democracy? I was very disappointed in our system after last night.
Most tragic of all I had to miss my Tuesday night pool session.
The nomination process is controlled by the parties.
Caucuses and primaries have no basis in our Constitution, therefore there's no legality or illegality to them. Remember, our Constitution doesn't say anything about a two-party system or any such crap. It's really just a system that evolved over time (and follows lots of precedent culturally).
This year's Democratic rules are very different from any rules that have been used in my lifetime. The long-standing traditions and rules were changed by Terry McCauliffe when he was secretary of the Democratic party apparatus back in 2004. Right after Kerry was defeated, and right before McCauliffe left his position as head of the party and it fell to Howard Dean.
So right before McCauliffe walked away, he changed the rules to move up a ton of primaries. The system was front-loaded toward February and Super Tuesday, with the ostencible goal of this being that the Democratic Party could shore up the nomination early and start competing against any eventual Republican nominee also early.
In 2004, everyone and their brother knew Hillary would be the nominee.
Oh, by the way, McCauliffe now leads Hillary's campaign...
(I actually don't see this too much as a conspiracy - no one in 2004 would have predicted Obama to be THIS strong).
Yesterday was supposed to decide the nominee. Whoops!
Okay, on to other things:
Caucusing is inherently un-democratic (to me) because it's not (necessarily, though the above is an exception) 1-person/1-vote, and because voting is not anonymous, secret ballot.
The Democratic party features a proportional delegate allocation process for almost all states, whereas the REpublican party generally goes with "winner-take-all". The Democrat system is biting Hillary in the ass, and the Republican one is benefitting McCain (and KILLING Romney). I can't say which I like better. Remember, ultimately primaries mean NOTHING because you can vote for whomever you want, regardless of who wins each party's primary.
__________________
Remember the dollar value to human life. Mine is priceless. Yours is negotiable. - unknown
I was with you right up until "Remember, ultimately primaries mean NOTHING". Sure you can vote for Mickey Mouse if you want in the general election, but realistically the primaries mean everything. Has anyone ever won the presidential election that was not nominated by their party? Certainly not in recent history. Winning the primary gives you all the money, media, and power needed to win a presidential election. Without it, it's not happening. That's the whole reason it's so disappointing to see the nomination process in such disarray. In many ways, electing the nominee can be just as important as the November election.
Yeah, I could do without the party system altogether, but I think we're stuck with it for a while.
Okay, I grant you saying they mean "nothing" is hyperbole. One of the two parties' nominees is going to become the next president. But it's not legally bindingly so.
It's unfortunate so few people feel motivated to vote their true choice (I don't, or I'd be voting for Ron Paul). That's not the system's fault, it's our own.
The primaries/caucuses are in disarray for a couple of reasons (or so I see). One is that nobody really had a grasp for how BADLY people hate Bush by now. So turnout on the Democratic side has been huge. Add that to the accelerated schedule McCauliffe put in place and it's a snowball into an avelanche. (Notice also how in every single state, Democrat turnout is easily 50 percent or more what Republican is). The second reason is that nobody counted on Obama being this effective/popular (you decide, though I think he's effective.)
__________________
Remember the dollar value to human life. Mine is priceless. Yours is negotiable. - unknown
Sounds like you got hosed KSC, but thats what you get for living in Broomfield . Not exactly known for their political activism up there.
My democratic caucus was crowded and chaotic, but we still got things done and to my knowledge no one was turned away or injured too badly. It was packed though, with probably 500+ people representing maybe 8-10 precincts. I was surprised at how well our state and our causcus pulled for Obama. Hillary barely even made the 15% viability mark in our precinct, which had 75 people show for it (the caucus chair said they usually only get 8-10 people for a caucus). She was one person shy of elimination (rats ). Definately was a good way to meet your local democrats, and I probably knew 10 of the 75 or so in our precinct.
I agree that our political system is undemocratic, outdated and in need of reform. That electoral college thing? WTF!!! And the party rules are definately written to tilt favor to party insiders (e.g. Hillary) over outsiders (e.g. Obama). But it was nice that our state moved up the date, because I'm tired of Colorado and the rest of the Mountain West being ignored by all of those East Coast bastard politicians.
Well it looks like this election is going to stay interesting, for awhile anyway.
No, I didn't get hosed. I got there early enough to get in. I raised my hand and got my vote counted and not for the Clinton monarchy. That doesn't do much for the people who didn't get a voice.
So let me ask you, it's nice that you met some of your fellow Democrats. Now maybe it will help you do a little rah rah, but did you have in depth discussions in your precinct? Did it result in anyone changing their votes? Did it raise any issues you weren't previously aware of? Would the same thing have been accomplished in 5 minutes by holding a ballot election instead?
I too missed the Tuesday night roll session to try to attend the caucus. I don't know what the turnout was because I couldn't figure out which precinct I should be in. I've never attended a caucus, but I assumed I should be in the same place I've voted in the last 2 elections. Apparently that wasn't the case. Unfortunately the place I vote is 25 min. from town when the roads are clear, so by the time I got there, discovered I was in the wrong place, came back to town to find the right place, it was all but over. What a mess. I guess I should be more prepared next time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by KSC
I'm with you rhm. I think the nomination process and the caucuses are part of an antiquated system that may have once made some sense, but certainly doesn't any longer.
I went to my caucus for the first time, since it's the first time Colorado has been able to cast a vote that mattered. The whole thing was a clusterfuck from the start. Apparently everybody, except the organizers, realized there was going to be a massive turnout this year. They were prepared for around a max of a few hundred people and instead got 1400. For most people, the process went something like this:
-try to arrive early, but instead wait in a traffic jam for 45 minutes.
-try to park anywhere you can jam your car
-wait outside in the freezing cold for half an hour
-wait inside for another half hour
-get shuffled around as people try to figure out various overflow arrangements and how to communicate information.
Others didn't make it inside at all. At some point the doors were closed and those still waiting outside were turned away. They no doubt went home angry and disenfranchised.
Once started, my precinct pretty much just took a straight up vote and that was the final vote. We had 17 Obama, 14 Clinton, 1 Edwards (??), and 1 abstained (??). Nobody was interested in changing their vote. It was actually a tough process just to get people in a decent enough space to hear what was going on and count the votes.
That amounted to 2 delegates for Obama and 2 for Clinton. So essentially the vote was diluted by making each precinct a voting block. Does this make any sense? Absolutely not. It may have once made a little sense when your precinct was a few neighbors on a farm and maybe had some special interest in the area, but now days, there's not anymore reason for my corner of the neighborhood to be a voting block than for the entire front range to be a voting block. There is no real time in the caucus to have a meaningful debate. We live in such an information rich world, that arrangements like this simply no longer apply.
Sometimes it's amazing to me how poorly these very important democrat processes adapt. As far as I'm concerned the whole party nomination process is about a century behind the times.
Nominations should be done through a normal ballot election. This will allow more people to participate and with much less hassle. And yes, it's also totally illogical to continue to give more importance to some states over others - even to the point that some states have no vote at all. Then a state like Florida tries to move up their election date so they have more votes and their delegates are disqualified.
Honestly, we're the country trying to export our great system of democracy? I was very disappointed in our system after last night.
Most tragic of all I had to miss my Tuesday night pool session.
. Not exactly known for their political activism up there.
). Definately was a good way to meet your local democrats, and I probably knew 10 of the 75 or so in our precinct.
Linear Mode
