Voting only for the party, not for the person??

[ACMESkydiver 0]

Is this going too far??

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Washington Has a New Primary System

What is it?

Washington has a new primary that will change the way you vote for the first time in almost 70 years.
The new system, modeled after the primary in the state of Montana, requires you to select a party ballot if you want to vote for candidates for partisan office.
For the first time, you may only vote for the candidates of one political party in the primary.
Your privacy will be protected. No record of your political party selection will be made.
Your right to vote for candidates for non-partisan office is not affected by this new law.
The most important point to remember about the Montana Primary is that if you don’t follow directions carefully your votes for partisan offices may not be counted.

Statewide, voters may receive different ballot styles. County Auditors are considering two main options:

1. Voters receive a single consolidated ballot:

The consolidated ballot includes all races and measures up for consideration in 2004. However, for partisan votes to count, you must affiliate with a political party by checking a box at the top of the ballot and only vote for that political party’s slate of candidates. Crossing over and voting for candidates of another political party will cost you your partisan votes.

2. Multiple ballots:

You receive multiple ballots - one for each political party – that includes all non-partisan races. You will also receive a ballot with non-partisan races only should you choose not to take a party ballot.

Any voter who votes and returns more than one party ballot will not have their votes counted for partisan offices.

The ballot procedures for voters will be determined at the county level. Contact the County Auditor to learn more about the ballot procedures in your area.

Read the Montana Primary Bill 6453

??? Guess I was just surprised at this...so if the party you predominantly vote for has one jackass on the ticket, you're hosed.

Link to the Washington state voters site...

I searched the posts but I didn't see anybody else mention this? Am I just really behind the times??

~Jaye
Do not believe that possibly you can escape the reward of your action.

[hooked 0]

I think this new method, totally sucks. Why should I have to vote within one party....suppose there is a better candidate in the other party? What BS.

J

--------------------------------------
Sometimes we're just being Humans.....But we're always Human Beings.

[peacefuljeffrey 0]

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I think this new method, totally sucks. Why should I have to vote within one party....suppose there is a better candidate in the other party? What BS.

J

This is just primary stuff, people, first of all.

Second of all, in the new "anything to win" mentality that is sooo disgustingly prevalent today, it is not unheard of for a party to mobilize voters to vote in the primaries for the weakest possible opponent-party candidate, thus potentially bringing about a false popularity for the person who then becomes that party's candidate. Result: that party puts forth a candidate who is a weak match against his opponent.


I don't see anything wrong with this plan as it has been explained so far. It seems to protect against having people who HATE a given party being able to have the best of both worlds. It locks them into having to make a primary vote for only one party, not, say, cruising down the ballot and making ad hoc decisions like, "Oh, the county judge, for that race, I'm gonna vote for the weakest possible opposition candidate," but back to their OWN party to pick the, say, Mayoral candidate they want to run in the election.

This seems to be an attempt to take some of the cynical manipulation out of the primary elections. I think I like it.

-

-Jeffrey
"With tha thoughts of a militant mind... Hard line, hard line after hard line!"

[PhillyKev 0]

That's better than what we have here. In PA you can only vote for the party you are registered in the primaries. That means Democrat or Republican, nothing else. At least there they can decide which parties primary they want to participate in at each election.

[EricTheRed 0]

As a washington voter, I agree. I think it's time to stop subsidizing the two party system.

The argument used in court to strike down open primary we did have was that the partys could chose who got to vote in their primary. They didn't want anyone to sabotage their party's choice by voting for someone "unelectable".

Fine. Use a caucus to select your candidate. Don't call it an election and make the rest of us pay for your poll.

illegible usually

[livendive 8]

Well, it is only the primary, not the election, but I still think it sucks too. It's a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. Just because it was *possible* to taint the opposition's nomination by voting for their weakest candidate doesn't mean it was really happening. I say fuck the parties. We should be able to vote our conscious and nominate whoever we most want to see elected. The vulnerability of the open primary was not being exploited and I don't think such a problem was looming in the near future, because the math makes it difficult to pull off. Now, instead of a potential problem, we'll have a real problem in every primary.

Blues,
Dave

"I AM A PROFESSIONAL EXTREME ATHLETE!"
(drink Mountain Dew)

[livendive 8]

Well, I went to the polls last night and got a bit concerned about another thing. The guy who gave me my ballot noted a unique identifying number for that ballot next to my name. He mostly convinced me that the ability to track the ballot would end when I turned it in, because we'd tear off the stub with that number, but it still seemed wierd.

As for having to pick a party, I did as requested and voted Libertarian only. There was only one race with more than one candidate (US Senate). There were several races with no candidate running and a simple "You may write in a candidate if you wish." Well one of those races was for Congress, so I wrote myself in and am now running against Doc Hastings for the 4th congressional district.

Blues,
Dave

"I AM A PROFESSIONAL EXTREME ATHLETE!"
(drink Mountain Dew)

[ACMESkydiver 0]

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There were several races with no candidate running and a simple "You may write in a candidate if you wish." Well one of those races was for Congress, so I wrote myself in and am now running against Doc Hastings for the 4th congressional district.

Blues,
Dave

SHWEET!!! DAVE FOR CONGRESS!!!!

~Jaye
Do not believe that possibly you can escape the reward of your action.

[livendive 8]

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I wrote myself in and am now running against Doc Hastings for the 4th congressional district.

SHWEET!!! DAVE FOR CONGRESS!!!!

While I am running as a Libertarian, I'm going to have to borrow heavily from the Polish Beer-Lover's Party in building my platform.

Unfortunately the results of yesterday's primary were announced today. Because I didn't get 1% of the vote, my name won't appear on the ballot. Still, I got one vote in the primary, maybe I can get 10 in the election!

Blues,
Dave

"I AM A PROFESSIONAL EXTREME ATHLETE!"
(drink Mountain Dew)

[tunaplanet 0]

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Voting only for the party, not for the person

Yes, that's how liberals vote.

Forty-two

[Morcyk 0]

There was a reason I chose "no party affiliation" when I registered to vote. I really don't care which party they're from, only the type of person I believe they are. This sux.