ron paul=awesome/kickass?

[knuckleboner]

I don't know that I agree ... if people believe in a campaign, they will donate time, effort and money to support it.

What you're describing is the tendency to want to "go with the winning team". When people do that, it's not because they believe in a candidate or their platform, it's because they want someone else (in the other party) to lose.

And that's just for voters registered in those parties ... the majority of the population aren't in either party.

The "majority" doesn't bother to wake up and pay attention to the campaign until convention time, when it's well past due for any real choice to go on. They are too complacent and let small portions of the population pre-select the two choices they have.

That's not a result of the primary system, that's a result of a complacent population that does not bother nor care to change things.

I have no sympathy for them. They believe in the fallacy of a two-party system and are willing to accept the consequences too easily.

i think it is the primary system. the primary system is NOT designed to give the average voter the chance to determine the party's nominee. it's designed to allow the party to shape how it wants its nominee chosen. caucuses are awful for selecting candidates. they are NOT designed for the voters. they're designed to energize the hardcore party faithful.

regardless of why, it should be embarrassing for the U.S. that our voter participation is so low. and leaving the system completely as is will not improve it.

[Dr. Love]

Most people aren't members of either party.

[knuckleboner]

which is exactly the problem. by and large, the 2 party primary system sets up the only 2 candidates who have a chance of winning the presidency.

by the time it gets to the general election, the current primary system's already turned OFF a decent amount of potential voters. that's not an ideal system.

the first step, i think, is get rid of caucuses. they are DESIGNED to weed out non-party faithful. if i'm not an obama fan, but not really a hardcore republican, i might want to have a say in who's going to go against him, but i'm probably not going to get invovled in a caucus. nor do they want me involved.

but put up a slate of candidates, and say, "here, you select which one you like best," and i might do it.

[Dr. Love]

Romney pulls in large crowds at his recent campaign stop in South Carolina:



That's what victory looks like

[LoungeMachine]

You really seem to like the hope and change. Obama has spent more money on welfare so I guess you might be benefitting?

*facepalm*

Yes, you're right....

The reason I choose Obama over Mitt Romney is because I'm on welfare....



Brilliant retort.

[Nitro Express]

Maybe you have some student loan debt you want wiped out so tax payers like me have to pay it? 46% of this nation aren't paying any income taxes and it's not just the rich connected fucks like Timothy Geithner that aren't. I would say people enjoying goods others have to pay for is flat out theft. Obama is a license to steal.

[Nitro Express]

I really don't like delegates because they are middle men who at the end of the day will vote the way they want. Like I said before we have the technology to allow the people themselves to cast the votes themselves directly. Eliminate the middle men. Really delegates and political parties are obsolete. All they do is limit choices. I don't think any of us here really like the choices we are given in these political races.

[Nitro Express]

I'm no expert but is it not true that Iowa, New Hampshire and North Dakota are particularly not representative of overall voters?

In the US the overall voters evenly fall into the conservative or liberal camps. I think Iowa is a mix of the two. North Dakota is most certainly conservative. I'm not sure about New Hampshire. I actually hate this two party system because the American public is more diverse than the system shows. Some of us may be liberal on some issues and conservative on others. I never felt I fit into any camp and would consider myself part of the swing voter population. I would rather just see a bunch of people go up for a general vote and then have several elections weeding the candidates down to a few finalists and at the last election the president is chosen. Screw the parties and screw this whole caucus and nomination system. We could vote directly as citizens voting a president in kind of like how judges pick the finalists in a dancing contest. Maybe have a year will several elections and then you have the finalist election and the one with the most votes becomes president.

[Dr. Love]

which is exactly the problem. by and large, the 2 party primary system sets up the only 2 candidates who have a chance of winning the presidency.

by the time it gets to the general election, the current primary system's already turned OFF a decent amount of potential voters. that's not an ideal system.

the first step, i think, is get rid of caucuses. they are DESIGNED to weed out non-party faithful. if i'm not an obama fan, but not really a hardcore republican, i might want to have a say in who's going to go against him, but i'm probably not going to get invovled in a caucus. nor do they want me involved.

but put up a slate of candidates, and say, "here, you select which one you like best," and i might do it.

so I'm not sure if you're saying everyone should join one of the parties or if we should have no party system at all...

[LoungeMachine]

In the US the overall voters evenly fall into the conservative or liberal camps. I think Iowa is a mix of the two. North Dakota is most certainly conservative. I'm not sure about New Hampshire. I actually hate this two party system because the American public is more diverse than the system shows. Some of us may be liberal on some issues and conservative on others. I never felt I fit into any camp and would consider myself part of the swing voter population. I would rather just see a bunch of people go up for a general vote and then have several elections weeding the candidates down to a few finalists and at the last election the president is chosen. Screw the parties and screw this whole caucus and nomination system. We could vote directly as citizens voting a president in kind of like how judges pick the finalists in a dancing contest. Maybe have a year will several elections and then you have the finalist election and the one with the most votes becomes president.

just wow....



Really wish I cared enough tonight to pick this apart line by line....

Maybe tomorrow.

[Nitro Express]

A lot of the old ways of doing things made sense when the speed of transportation was a guy on horseback. Hell we could just keep our Senators and Congressmen in their home states and let them vote electronically instead of being in Washington DC. It would make it more difficult for the lobbyists to get to them. When they are all in Washington at the same time it makes corrupting them so much more easier.

Hell just let the citizens vote on the bills. The congress doesn't bother to read them anyways. The public probably couldn't do anymore damage.

[Nitro Express]

so I'm not sure if you're saying everyone should join one of the parties or if we should have no party system at all...

We live in a country now that we have a lot of choices on things that don't matter. If you want ice cream you have a huge selection of flavors. If you want jelly beans there is a huge selection. In fact we have more choices on some of these things than ever before. But on the things that matter we have had our choices whittled down to nothing. We went from over 50 media companies to 5. We only have two political parties that can win the White House. We have fewer oil companies than we used to have. So on the unimportant shit we have choices on the things that shape our future we have very little and the trend is for it to get worse.

I mean there's the joke of calling the Republican and Democrat parties the Republocrat Party because there is no real choice there. Both are owned by the same people. In other words we have the illusion of choice but there really isn't any real choice.

So what many people now want is a system that gives us more choice. So many people get eliminated because they don't have the party blessing. So much of this caucus voting is just a bunch of nothing anyways. It's the delegates who have the actual voting power and they can vote any way they want to. Then we the public get to vote on who the delegates picked. Not much choice there and it's an easy system to corrupt.

Wouldn't it just be better if we put all the candidates in a big pool, then the public vote on them and a certain number who get the highest votes go onto the next election. Make it like a tennis tournament then the winner of the final match becomes president and the people had a voice in all of the process. I doubt most voters even know who their delegates are and these are the people who decide who your party nomination will be. It really seems undemocratic because that whoe process is so behind the scenes.

[knuckleboner]

so I'm not sure if you're saying everyone should join one of the parties or if we should have no party system at all...

neither. just that the current system doesn't lead to great choices for the average voter. i think a viable 3rd party could help. but that's a much bigger change.

in the interim improve the process so more people get involved.

[Dr. Love]

Louisiana Shocker: Ron Paul Wins
By Doug Wead

Well, the cat is out of the bag. Saturday’s district conventions in Louisiana gave the Ron Paul campaign 74% of the delegates heading into the June state convention where the delegation to the Republican National Convention in Tampa will be finally determined. Another state, another unseen victory for the Texas congressman. And, it should be noted, another embarrassment for the apparent nominee, former Governor Mitt Romney. Now, the question is this. How many other states have their own surprises coming?

Months ago the Ron Paul campaign looked at Louisiana and decided that the best strategy was to concentrate on the caucus. The rules in Louisiana apportion 20 of the states delegates from the votes in its statewide primary, which was held last March and 24 delegates from it caucus system which elects delegates at the precinct level to go to district conventions where they elect delegates to go to the state convention where the final delegation will be chosen.

What would you do? Spend your money trying to win the 20? Or spend your money trying to win the 24? Former Pennsylvania Senator, Rick Santorum, former Speaker, Newt Gingrich, and former governor, Mitt Romney, spent their money competing for the publicity of the statewide primary, which Santorum won and which he proudly and tearfully acknowledged before a national television audience last March. Our hapless New York Times and Associated Press duly reported that the delegates in Louisiana would be awarded 15 to Santorum and 5 to Romney. Ron Paul was not even a mention. But as Lee Corso would say, “Not so fast.”

The actual delegates will be chosen at a state convention in June which Ron Paul supporters will now dominate. Not just by a bare majority but by 74%. It means that they will not only get their 24 delegates to Santorum’s 15 and Romney’s 5, but they will also decide who the delegates representing Santorum and Romney will be. Ain’t it sweet? And it is the brainchild of Jesse Benton – John Tate’s masterful delegate strategy run by our intrepid, Dimitri Kesari.

Shortly after the Newt Gingrich victory in South Carolina the hope for Louisiana seemed like a long shot. There was even talk of helping Gingrich there, to blunt Romney and Santorum. But the campaign surged and the moneybombs came through (thank you) and men and women at the grass roots refused to give up in the face of sometimes hostile party operatives.

Saturday, it all paid off and Ron Paul won majorities in contests in Congressional Districts 1, 2, 5 and 6. The decision in district 4 was close, with Ron Paul winning almost half.

What does it mean? It means you should review some of the posts written on this blog and read carefully what was predicted. As of now, the Ron Paul campaign is ahead of anything anticipated and is doing more with less than any modern presidential campaign in recent memory. It means that there are more surprises coming. It means that Ron Paul will be a factor in Tampa.

Onto Texas, where liberty may once again make its last stand on May 29, 2012 in the Texas Primary. Remember the Alamo.

Notation Update: It gets better. This from a member of our Louisiana team.

Doug can you please correct something in your post (even better than you state). Because of the allocation rules of bound delegates in the beauty contest primary – only 15 of the 20 primary delegates were awarded!! The other 5 get awarded at state convention WE now control!

So…only 10 delegates are bound to Santorum and 5 delegates bound to Romney (from Primary). No other delegates are bound.

To summarize:

-20 delegates (all can be Paul backers, 5 bound to Paul, 5 bound to Romney and 10 bound to Santorum)
-18 CD Delegates (Paul can easily get 12, could get up to all 18 if we work with Santorum/Gingrich people)
-5 by “executive committee” – no clue if we have supporters on this thing and they go to RNC as uncommitted.
-3 party leaders.

http://dougwead.wordpress.com/2012/04/29/louisiana-shocker-ron-paul-wins/

Again, there's the Paul strategy... get as many pledged delegates as you can, and get your own supporters elected as pledged delegates to someone else if they can't pledge to Paul.

Every delegate out of Louisiana may very well wind up being a Paul supporter.

[Dr. Love]

There's some claim that the rules set forth by the RNC in 2008 and 2010 state that delegates are not officially bound at the national convention and can vote their conscience. Interesting if true!

Anyway, to get to the point, I found some information that may be helpful...

"As set out in the Rules of the Republican Party, delegates have the ability to vote according to the delegates’ preference, even if that is contrary to the outcome of each state’s primary. According to one source, the legal counsel for the Republican National Convention in 2008 stated: “[The] RNC does not recognize a state’s binding of national delegates, but considers each delegate a free agent who can vote for whoever they choose.” Thus, if a delegate were to challenge his or her ability to vote as a free agent, he or she would have grounds under Rule 38."

This comes from: http://www.fairvote.org/response-to-...nvention-how-g...

RULE NO. 38
Unit Rule
"No delegate or alternate delegate shall be bound by any attempt of any state or Congressional district to impose the unit rule."

Directly from: The Rules of the Republican Party
As Adopted
by the 2008 Republican National Convention
September 1, 2008

*Amended by the
Republican National Committee
on August 6, 2010

Please exercise your due diligence and obviously don't take my word for anything, but I just wanted to share what I thought was relevant.

To all of you, God Bless!

A pretty good summary of delegate rules and binding:

http://www.fairvote.org/response-to-a-rogue-convention-how-gop-party-rules-may-surprise-in-201#.T54GZFLOuSr