By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close

Forums - Politics Discussion - Official 2020 US Election: Democratic Party Discussion

Shadow1980 said:
tsogud said:

330 million people live in the U.S. and only 3.4% of them voted for Biden (about 11 mil.) I'd say that's hardly the will of the people.

Well, since it's technically a different topic from last time and it involves math, I wanted to address this one particular thing.

To be fair, you could say that about any primary, really, both Democratic and Republican. Turnout always sucks in primaries relative to the general election. Even in the general election at least 40% or more of American adults don't vote, though that's mainly because roughly 30-33% of Americans over 18 weren't registered to vote in any given election year in recent history. Turnout of registered voters in presidential elections is high, but it's lower for midterms and especially primaries.

For example, only 5.8% of Americans (7.6%, if we only count the over-18 population since they're the only ones that can vote) voted for Obama in the 2008 Democratic primaries, and that was the best year in a very long time for turnout in the Democratic primaries. Obama and Hillary had about 35 million votes combined in the 2008 primary. In the general election, Obama received 69.5M votes, nearly twice as many as actually voted in the Dem primary. In total, about 59M people voted in both the Democratic and Republican primaries combined, yet Obama and McCain had a combined popular vote of about 129.4M, over twice as many as actually voted in the primaries. That year, only about 36% of registered voters actually voted in the primaries, while about 80% of them voted in the general. Even in New Hampshire, which has an open primary and typically the highest turnout among all the primaries, the number of people that showed up to vote in the primaries was about 26% lower than the number of people that showed up to vote in the general election. With such low turnout, only a relatively small number of total adults or even just total registered voters will actually vote for the eventual Democratic or Republican nominee in the primaries. So no nominee ever reflects "the will of the people."

In fact, you could argue that no elected representative at all actually reflects "the will of the people." Only about 30% of the adult population voted for Obama in 2008, and he had the highest popular vote count ever in absolute terms (Nixon and Reagan have him beat in terms of share among post-WW2 candidates, but not by a significant amount). Well under half of the voting-age population in nearly every jurisdiction is responsible for putting any representative in office, be they a governor, a Senator, a House member, a mayor, etc., because of the aforementioned relatively low turnout in the U.S.

Perhaps, "will of the voters" is more accurate. After all, only those that can and do vote actually have a say in who wins elections.

Granted, even that's often not accurate due to voter suppression (something that seems to always happen in GOP-led states) and some contests having significant distorting effects either because the electoral rules are inherently unrepresentative themselves or because someone is bending the rules to their advantage. Namely, House districts are subject to gerrymandering (which is why we need anti-gerrymandering laws or, preferably, proportional representation), and Presidential elections have the Electoral College (which needs to be abolished in favor of a national popular vote). But it is mostly true for Senate elections and gubernatorial elections. Whoever earns the most votes in those contests wins. There's no way to gerrymander states because their borders are permanently fixed, and there are no state-level equivalents of an electoral college for selecting governors, so assuming no voter suppression or other shenanigans the winners of those elections are those who legitimately earned a plurality or majority of the votes. There is still room for improvement even in those contests, and I think every election needs some sort of ranked choice voting system, but in a contest with only two candidates and no way for parties to choose their voters, the candidate with the most votes wins.

As for primaries, they're... complicated. It's hard to say if things like their staggered nature or the existence of caucuses are distorting effects (and then there's the debate on open vs. closed primaries). And FWIW, neither party is legally obligated to even hold primary elections in the first place, as they are private organizations that can set their own rules regarding things like membership or candidate selection. That voters have any input at all on the matter of who represents the party on the ballot is a courtesy afforded to us, and almost certainly due to increased pressure for more democracy. Primaries being the, uh, primary means of selecting nominees is something that's very recent, and it was within my lifetime that both parties had primaries/caucuses in all 50 states.

But with that being said, looking at the actual delegate allocation rules set by each party, I think the Democratic primaries have the better rules as they award pledged delegates on a roughly proportional basis, and so there are arguably no significant distorting effects in the actual electoral rules. The pledged delegate count isn't always exactly proportional to the popular vote count (there is that 15% threshold rule), but the odds of the pledged delegate count being way off the mark compared to the popular vote shares are very low. Kerry won 61% of the popular vote and 62% of the pledged delegates in the 2004 primaries. In 2008, there were some oddities (Obama taking his name off the Michigan ballot, and four caucus states never actually releasing popular vote counts), but by most accounts Obama barely edged out Hillary in 2008 in the popular vote and also just barely beat her in the pledged delegate count. Hillary had 55% of the pledged delegates and 54% of the popular vote in the 2016 primaries. And while the current primaries aren't over yet, the popular vote and pledged delegate ratios between Biden and Sanders are nearly dead-on proportional (though both are currently over-represented compared to the other candidates, though that's almost certain to change as results continue to come in from more states). So far, in at least the past 20 years the outcome of Democratic primaries has closely reflected the will of Democratic primary voters, and it's highly unlikely that the national popular vote winner will fail to earn the most pledged delegates and thus the nomination. Is there still room for improvement? Most definitely (and I wouldn't mind debating possible reforms to the primary process at a later time), but the Democratic primary rules have done a good job of making sure who wins is actually the biggest vote earner.

Meanwhile, the GOP primaries have a mish-mash of rules, including many states that are winner-take-all, so there is a significant distorting effect similar to that of the Electoral College. For example, Trump won 58.3% of the delegates in 2016 with only 45% of the vote, which is quite unrepresentative. Double-digit disparities between popular vote and delegate counts are the norm because of all the WTA states. However, ever since primaries have been the main means of selecting party nominees, the candidate with the most popular votes became the GOP nominee, and over the past 40 years all but two winners won with an absolute majority of the popular vote (McCain and Trump only had a plurality). It is conceivable, however, that in a close enough race the runner-up could earn the most delegates and thus win the primary simply by winning enough of the right states. The odds of such an outcome are far more likely than with the Democratic primaries.

The way that the Democratic primaries are conducted are better than the Republican party to be sure. Primaries need to start being treated as importantly as the general. We need to revamp how and when the primaries are held like having all states vote on the same day and having election day a national holiday, both primary and general election. I'm just suggesting things off the top of my head but I'm sure there's other ways that are better.



 

Around the Network

Cornel West talks about the broken system of the US that has lead to the riots, has lead to the mistrust of the Reps and the Dems, has lead to the mistrust of the Est Media, the people want a lot better, not the same   

Last edited by Rab - on 02 June 2020

Shadow1980 said:
tsogud said:

The way that the Democratic primaries are conducted are better than the Republican party to be sure. Primaries need to start being treated as importantly as the general. We need to revamp how and when the primaries are held like having all states vote on the same day and having election day a national holiday, both primary and general election. I'm just suggesting things off the top of my head but I'm sure there's other ways that are better.

It's not the first time I've seen it suggested that the primary should be a single election on one day instead of being a series of contests staggered over a period of 4-5 months. It seems like a good idea to me. Every other election is done on the same day. One argument I've seen in favor of staggered primaries is that it allows candidates to focus on a few states at a time, but if being able to campaign in every state is essential, then wait until summertime to have the election. Have it on, say, the first weekend in July (meaning both days, to give everyone enough time to vote), and then have the convention at the end of the month. That ought to give every candidate enough time to campaign throughout the nation. Ranked-choice voting should be implemented as well, of course.

There's also the issue of caucuses and open vs. closed primaries. Caucuses ought to be done away with entirely (they've become less frequent, with only four states having one this year). As for primaries, it's hard to say if they should be open, closed, or semi-open. The question will always remain "Should non-Democrats be allowed to have a say in who represents the Democratic Party on the ballot?" After all, political parties are private organizations, not a de facto or de jure part of the government, and therefore there's issues regarding things like freedom of associate. FairVote has an article about the subject here. But regardless of the type, primaries should be the rule.

The problem is that primaries are run by state and local governments, though I wonder how much leeway the DNC has to pressure states to have all of their primaries on one day, or to simply operate the primary process themself.

@bolded: Can somebody explain me the difference? We don't have primaries or caucuses here, so I don't know what's what.

As for having them all on the same day, that also seems to be the best course of action to me. The parties don't necessarily need to have theirs all on the same date. So the primaries of the republican, democratic, green, libertairian, etc... don't all have to happen at the same time, but each party would need to have a single day for their own primary election. And yeah, primaries need to have a ranked choice, especially since candidates can drop out at any time.



Obama's speech ignores his own record, he wants the same system and the same people he had before Trump, he wants us to accept it, remembering Black Lives Matter started under his watch 

Last edited by Rab - on 07 June 2020

Bill Clinton revelation of him being on Jeffrey Epstein's Island at the time of pedophile activities but denied by the Clintons and ignored by mainstream media

Bill Clinton lying about his presence on Epstien's Island even when he was witnessed being there

Leadership of the US political parties is atrocious being protected by partisan mainstream media, the system is not working for the people that need honest leadership, it works for the powerful    



Around the Network
Rab said:

Obama's speech ignores his own record, he wants the same system and the same people he had before Trump, he wants us to accept it, remembering Black Lives Matter started under his watch 

Another one sided opinion piece.  The reason why this is garbage is that she says he is right that in order for change you have to be involved in your city and state elections but try to dismiss those statements.  This opinion also forget that he did institute policy change for police brutality which Trump reverse every last one of them.  So them acting as if he did not try to make a change is BS and this is how opinion narrative only push their own opinion but doesn't cover everything.  What we do know is that Trump has done nothing, has reverse everything put into place to curve police brutality and so far has shone he is willing to do absolutely nothing to better relations between the Police and their communities.  Its evident this opinion piece stated everything you wanted to hear but was nowhere close to being comprehensive in its narration on the subject.



Machiavellian said:
Rab said:

Obama's speech ignores his own record, he wants the same system and the same people he had before Trump, he wants us to accept it, remembering Black Lives Matter started under his watch 

Another one sided opinion piece.  The reason why this is garbage is that she says he is right that in order for change you have to be involved in your city and state elections but try to dismiss those statements.  This opinion also forget that he did institute policy change for police brutality which Trump reverse every last one of them.  So them acting as if he did not try to make a change is BS and this is how opinion narrative only push their own opinion but doesn't cover everything.  What we do know is that Trump has done nothing, has reverse everything put into place to curve police brutality and so far has shone he is willing to do absolutely nothing to better relations between the Police and their communities.  Its evident this opinion piece stated everything you wanted to hear but was nowhere close to being comprehensive in its narration on the subject.

They base the discussion off actual events and historical facts, it is well balanced and insightful, it's in great contrast to mainstream media and Est Dems ideology around Obama who would defend him and hold him up no matter what, Obama really talked the talk but was very watered down/compromised in his delivery to the people, his healthcare is a case in point, he was never prepared to dismantle the broken system, he just tweaked it and made massive compromises that kept the status quo going. Obama is rarely looked closely at, it's great that they are prepared to

Doing a job for 8 years, then making statements about the things you didn’t do :/

Obama often praised young people as the future of politics, and encouraged them to fight for their beliefs, but then avoids Bernie Sanders young peoples movement and instead endorses Joe Biden to help the status quo, bringing back all the same people and the establishment of the past that is the very thing young people fight against, he talks sweet, but delivers little for the people    

In the end Obama made very little systemic change, but gave the illusion he did, he sounded and looked very Presidential, some people are reluctant to analyse that in detail, but not the Hill thankfully        

Last edited by Rab - on 07 June 2020