Do you trust the Primary process?

[Labors of Hercules]

Poll question: Do you trust the Primary process?

With the gauntlet we're making our candidates run, we have not made it easy, and whoever earns the nomination will have TRULY earned it (one way or another).

The question is, do you trust that our primary process will give us the BEST nominee?

[mmonk]

1. The two No's in combination.

[Labors of Hercules]

3. Thanks!

:toast:

[mmonk]

4. Did you add a No?

Or did I miss one the first go around?

[Labors of Hercules]

5. yep.

combined the two into one answer and added a couple more...

[mmonk]

6. whew! I feel better.

Thanks.:toast:

[madokie]

2. of course

[LeftCoast]

7. I don't think trust is the right word. I think our current primary system is crap.

First of all, the primary season has been pushed far to early. We will have a presidential campaign that lasts 7 or 8 months. Absolutely ridiculous.

Then you've got two small unrepresentative states with far too much influence in the process. Most voters will have virtually no say in who their party picks. I fully expect that even though California has moved up our primary, I will yet again be presented with a fait acompli by the time we have our primary. I'm sorry, but that's just crap. Why is it that Californians never get a say? Hardly seems Democratic to me.

So no, I'm not a fan of our current system.

[Liberal In Texas]

16. I agree. The primary system needs to be completely overhauled.

If we're not going to have primary day on the same day for everyone, then we need to at least choose, say, 10 states scattered as evenly as possible throughout the country to have their primaries first, on the same day. 4 years later, a different 10 states would go first. And so on.

I can't remember ever having voted in a primary where the leading candidate didn't already have it all sewn up.

[NoPasaran]

8. I prefer the old smoke-filled room system

This system of letting the people pick the candidate is just plain nuts.

[Balbus]

9. How does the media control the outcome?

When I go to vote, I'm pretty much by myself. Tom Brokaw isn't standing next to me, nudging my hand to a different candidate that I want to choose. When I turn in my ballot, I don't hand it to Katie Couric who promptly erases my vote and marks the one the "media" wants... So are you saying all those ballot boxes get shipped straight to my local news affiliate who throw out the ones that are voting the way the "media" doesn't want?

If that's not the case, then how in the hell does the media control my vote?

[RC]

10. NO! With the DINO Dem running things, we'll elect our own republican president.

Only thing different they will not have too many republican scandals. They will be DINO scandals, but for the same reason. Second verse, same as the first.
Then we can enjoy another repubcon administration in 2012.

[TreasonousBastard]

11. Other-- I hate the primary system, but not for..

the reasons stated.

The "media" is largely irrelevant in primary contests. You people apend too much time watching MSNBC and CNN and have no idea what local news outlets are doing or what people are talking about in the churches or honky tonks.

It's money that controls any sort of election-- always has been and always will be. You could argue that the best candidates will naturally collect the most money, but that one's easy to rip big holes in. Nope, whover is best at collecting monety has the advantaqe, and anyone bad at it is completely out of the running. Exceptions can be found, but they are rare.

I really don't trust the "people' to give us the best candidates. Sorry, but this democracy shit is really overrated. It might be better than all other systems, but it ain't perfect by a long shot. Who the fuck are Iowa and New Hampshire to decide so early in the year and have such a huge influence on things? Why does the rest of the country bother to listen to them in the rest of the primaries? What's this "jumpstart" crap? The rest of the country can't think for itself?

Have one damn primary in June or July when most of the country is on vacation and only the people who give a shit and are more likely know something about the candidates vote. Them the campaiging for the general won't take almost a whole year. Unfortunately, this is impossible under the present system.

[Uncle Joe]

13. Except that the people with the money

own the media, and it's usually the media who determine how much air time any given candidate is given during the debates, they're grossly unfair as managed.

The national media and that includes all networks run those Sunday morning talk shows that focus on politics, not to mention their nightly news and if out of eight candidates all they mention are two or three over and over, usually focusing the vast majority of their time on just the horse race, the other candidates don't come in to the American People's consciousness as a serious consideration if at all.

If democracy is overrated, what's better and if nothing under the sun is better, why don't the money owned media give democracy it's due?

The primaries are another matter and I don't have anything against a national primary, I also believe they should make it a national holiday so the people living pay check pay to pay check have more time and inclination to participate, but I believe the corrupted powers that be, really don't want participation from the American People as a whole.

I believe if the spirit of democracy had been respected in 2000, we wouldn't have Bush today and all the subsequent disastrous misrule that followed.

[TreasonousBastard]

17. What national media? Who watches that stuff on...

Sunday morning or on the cable channels?

We're talking primary season, and it's all local coverage or talk down at the Dairy Queen. Senator Passgas hits your little town and soon enough everybody knows it and will be talking about it. For five minutes until the next one blows through.

[Uncle Joe]

18. That may true for a relatively small section of the nation

but much of it never sees Passgas, and for the areas that do five minutes is probably about right for the visit and then it's back to the six corporations that own 90+% of every thing the American People see, hear and read to put their spin on it.

There is still a fair amount of the nation with out viable Internet access, mostly the remote central regions that tend to vote Republican and I don't believe that's just a coincidence. Television and radio to a lesser extent is still the dominant source of information for them, even the newspapers have become part of a growing conglomeration, such as Gannet.

[CrispyQ]

12. Another option:

No - we vote on the same vote stealing machines in the primary as the general.

[Labors of Hercules]

14. DAMN.

That's a good point.

[warren pease]

15. Other: I don't trust the machines and...

... I don't trust the candidates who took their maximum bribes from corporate america and "private donors" and used these filthy funds to buy more air time, generate more name recognition, suck up to the TV punditocracy and, therefore, ending up as the officially approved corporate front-runners.

Notice what's happening with Edwards. At last, he starts sounding like a real populist and all of a sudden the rat bastards on TV can't say enough bad things about him. Kucinich, not interested in either corporate money or hiding his agenda, has had this same problem from the outset. And it's not an accident; it's a problem that's built into the system.

Public financing of all campaigns; hand written and hand counted paper ballots; equal air time for all; actual debates instead of the long version of their 30-second commercials -- then maybe I'd slowly begin to trust the system. As it is now, it's rigged to produce the least likely people to meddle with the status quo, and they are the last people on earth I want to waste my vote on.


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