Contested primaries
Here’s a pretty good article about how presidential primaries work, and why it’s that way:
…[I]ncreasingly, any primary process can be effectively overwhelmed by a highly motivated subset of voters who bear little resemblance to the electorate as a whole.
The job of a political party, though, isn’t simply to validate the vote, to lend itself out as a vehicle for whatever uprising has suddenly taken hold in its ranks. Parties exist to advance agendas, to enact policies, to attain and hold power. They exist, in other words, to win.
Trump doesn’t really adhere to any governing agenda, and a mountain of polls suggest that he repulses a strikingly high percentage of voters. If Trump arrives in Cleveland with 1,237 delegates, then he’s earned the nomination, without having resorted to subterfuge or even having tapped his own fortune, and Republicans are stuck with him anyway. But if that number tops out at 1,236, then you can bet the party’s leaders will explore their options.
I would go even further than the author and add that, even if it looks like a candidate (Trump or anyone else) will get enough votes to win on the very first ballot, the party can still change the rules and nominate another person. That would be highly unwise, in my opinion, both in terms of the general and the future of that party, because that really would be ignoring the will of the majority of the people who bothered to vote in the GOP primaries.
I’ll also point out that my notion that parties should have a certain amount of power over their nominee selection process and not merely be the rubber-stamp of primary voters long predates the Trump candidacy. In this 2008 post I wrote the following:
I’ve never been convinced that nominees are best selected by popular vote, anyway. Primaries lock in a nominee too far in advance, and can’t reflect subsequent events closer to election time. They also favor demagogues or the passing candidate de jour, as well as dictating that Presidential office-seekers appeal to the most extreme wing of their Parties in primaries, and then tack back to the middle for the general elections.
“Favor demagogues.” Hmmm.
[NOTE: Also see this comment of mine.]
“I would go even further than the author and add that, even if it looks like a candidate (Trump or anyone else) will get enough votes to win on the very first ballot, the party can still change the rules and nominate another person. That would be highly unwise, in my opinion, both in terms of the general and the future of that party, because that really would be ignoring the will of the majority of the people who bothered to vote in the GOP primaries.”
At the risk of Pauline Kael Syndrome, I’ll say that everyone I’ve spoken to feels this exact way. Everyone except the Trumpkins, who keep pushing the opposite narrative because it suits their paranoia and political agenda.
There’s not going to be any damned rules changes, and everyone knows it.
Erick Erickson offered an explanation last night on the radio that appeared to preclude the GOPe making any self-serving rule changes.
There is a rules committee at the convention that can change the rules at any time but it is made up of delegates. Trump and especially Cruz have managed to get to a majority of them so the committee will be stacked with their own delegates, preventing the GOPe from at least changing the convention’s rules to put up anyone besides the two of them.
If they try to it will have to be using a more underhanded method.
“Parties exist to advance agendas, to enact policies, to attain and hold power.” Matt Bai
The GOPe agenda is clear; the ever greater accumulation of money, status, power and control.
“I’ve never been convinced that nominees are best selected by popular vote” neo
The popular vote’s flaws are obvious. When the party chooses its nominee, it presupposes loyalty to the voters. When the party deceitfully abuses that trust, it invalidates its legitimacy.
I think the gope realizes that major rule changes are a hand grenade with the pin pulled in their hands. They will try to shift delegates to either Trump or Cruz. If they lean towards Trump it will be because they fear a potential President Cruz as breaking their rice bowls with a real conservative revolution. Better a hrc POTUS than those troglodyte conservatives breaking bowls. If they lean towards Cruz it will be because they fear what happens down ticket with kamikaze Trump which will not break rice bowls but take some rice from their bowls when they become a senate minority.
I’ve been thinking about this, and I think what we should do is:
1. There is a “primary primary” seven months before the convention. It is on ONE day, all over the country, and only live, in person voting.
2. And only people REGISTERED AS REPUBLICANS get to vote in it. Screw “open primary” states — this is not about California, et al, this is about s specific political party, regardless of the state. Why should the California or other states’ legislatures get to dictate who a NATIONAL party decides to represent their party in a NATIONAL election?
3. Voters WRITE IN the names of THREE REPUBLICANS they would like to see run for president. They have to be people who have been registered as Republicans for a minumum of four years. If they have served in elected office, they must have served a minimum of four years AS A REPUBLICAN. Of all the names written in, the top six or so are chosen to run for the nomination. Admittedly, you may wind up with 1,000 people writing in the mayor of some small city, but I think there would be enough people to take it seriously to write in good candidates.
4. The final primaries (and caucuses) are all on one day, one month before the convention. Nominees chosen six months earlier will have had six months to criss cross the country campaigning.
5. Sure, there are debates, but not moderated by freaking news outlets. If TV wants to carry it, fine they can, but the moderators are people the party CHOOSES. And they choose people like the President of Hillsdale College. Or Mark Steyn. or neoneocon! Hell, I’d even taken Karl Rove since he is a Republican. Again, this is about people associated with a party choosing the candidate from their party that they want running for president. And the debates can be streamed somewhere on the internet. Like, hey! Her’s a thought: the FREAKING GOP WEBSITE….!
6. The VP candidate is picked in much the same way the actual US VP’s were chosen way back when: The runner up. (I’m still iffy on this — it’s kind of based on the assumption that 1 through 5 prove somewhat effective.)
The electoral college and the primary system are complex because they developed organically over centuries.
Sitting down now and believing you can out think centuries of decisions on how to elect officials is a statist, leftist approach. It won’t work, it can’t work.
Accept things the way they are and work within the system.
#neverRodham #neverHillary