Winner-Take-All Primaries Are Ridiculous
I just want to say this before any results are in for Florida, lest anyone think it's just griping because my guy lost:
I think it's absolutely ridiculous that if one candidate gets 0.1% more of the FL vote, he gets ALL the delegates. Although I realize the benefit of winner-take-all for a particular state, it seems borderline insane to me from the standpoint of the party choosing its nominee democratically. I wish the national parties would insist on some sort of proportional delegate allocation.
Am I missing something here? Is there some reason why winner-take-all primaries are better for a party (nationally) or the nation?
Oh, and if McCain wins FL...never mind.
Submitted by B Rational on Tue, 2008-01-29 15:30
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They make the result appear more lopsided
and that might confer legitimacy upon the nominee for the general election that he wouldn't have if the primary appeared really close.
But I agree, I don't know why the GOP still does it that way. I'd prefer a compromise, where a chunk of the delegates go to the winner (so states still get $$ from candidates campaigning) and the rest are split proportionally (with a minimum level for viability to get any).
Come, my friends. 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world -- Tennyson
Agreed, but...
technically the parties can run primaries any way they want. What kills me is the winner take all aspect of the electoral college.
I came. I saw. I posted.
Veni, Vidi, Bitchy.
I agree re: electoral
I agree re: electoral college. Only concern I would have re: abandoning state-level winner take all in the general election is the prospect of a national recount, but that would be much less likely in the primaries.
Proportional allocation
Proportional allocation
by state is the only way to go. No need for a national recount. In addition, most recounts won't be needed because a large swing of the vote would have to occur to in most states to flip an elector. California would have to have an error of around .55%, depending on rounding rules, but small states like Alaska could be off by as much as 33% and not have any effect on the EC.
In practice, everyone would have to change at the same time otherwise we get into unilateral disarmament scenarios and patently unfair EC allocations.
I never broke the law; I am the law! --
George W. BushJudge DreddI'm listening to...
Dems are almost always proportional
See this link for details on proportional primaries
.
This is illustrative of one of the big reasons that I favor the Democrats over Republicans--you'll actually find people who care about democracy among the Democrats.
"You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man." --Frederick Douglas