Skip to main content

Democracy and the "Party Vote"

On this occasion I would like to focus on the happenings of the Democratic Party at this point in the election cycle. Here, we have a conflict of interests. Yes of course, the Obama v. Clinton conflict is strong and well, though bad for the party and yet good as well, but I speak of another conflict, between old guard and next generation democracy. You may think automatically that I'm still talking about the candidates, and indirectly I am, but I'm really talking about the process by which we nominate candidates for the general election.

Our nomination process runs off the old model of democracy "with limits". Candidates must get some number of delegates (2024) and they win the nomination. What we must understand is that in the present format, party elections are not democratic at all. In fact, the only democratic part about the nomination process, the public vote, doesn't even have to be followed. In addition, so-called "super delegates" (in name alone implying a greater quality than regular delegates) don't have to vote for the person that the popular vote goes to in any quantity, majority/minority percentage or winner takes all. And, why do delegates exist at all? Why not have the popular vote count? Isn't that what promises an election in November, the most votes? Some will say that it alienates the smaller states, and while it doesn't do that (as they still vote), it does punch down the overly inflated airbag they call their vote, back into the democratic, one person one equal vote, mold.

This system is old guard, like the Electoral College, like Senators being voted in by committee (akin to the super delegates) and not by the people at all. These "protections" were put in place subvert democracy. The idea that the party's success is more important than the public's will is anti-democratic, regardless of whatever way it impacts the general election. The idea that the public can subvert popular democracy is not only false, but impossible. The public will IS the result of whatever popular democracy births. But, we live in a nation of protected democracy, where the old values of protectionist politics still remains, where the establishment chooses it's successor in a process akin to the elections the Russian Federation and not the democratic country that we claim to be. In this "great democracy" the people's votes are circumvented at every turn to make the process "easier" and "safer" when in fact, while such notions are debatable, the realization that regardless of that the process is still undemocratic remains paramount in the fight of the old guard, the conservatives by definition, to maintain a hold on the party and on power.

Those in power choose who is to replace them. They are built in their image. And Hillary Clinton is clearly the choice of the super delegates so far, of the old guard and the old way of democracy. Change comes in leaps and bounds my friends, and we cannot be afraid to take that leap of faith when the time is right. We have a chance to push a candidate through the system this election cycle, one who, if the system had any control over, it would have defeated them long ago.

This said, I give you my choice for President of the United States: Vote Barack Obama, 2008. Change should never be ridiculed for without it we would all be Republicans.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Reagan, Deregulation, and the Fruit It Now Bears

President Reagan had an idea about how the world should run. He deregulated Big Business. That is, he removed the restrictions put in place that kept companies from cheating. He removed, primarily economic oversight. He said that it was unAmerican that in this capitalist society that such oversight, such restrictions should exist. To him, these concepts flew in the face of that illusive, figmentary idea we like to call freedom. He wanted Big Business to have the freedom to do what it will and believed that in doing so, said companies would check themselves. They would check themselves because it was in their best economic interest to do so. Yet, what he didn't realize is that what was in the best interest of Corporate America could be unknown to Corporate America itself! That Big Business could be akin to a compulsive gambler who as they fall further and further into the hole panic and begin making riskier and riskier bets, thus then subjecting themselves to even more debt ...

My Last

 My previous post was found as a blank page in draft form this evening.  I found the existence of it to be rather poetic.  So I published it blank as is over a year later.  Seems fitting to be honest.

There's a Reason Why There Are No Good Politicians

That is to say there is a reason why there are no politicians with genuine interests at heart. Genuine interests can be defined as points of view on which you are inflexible to opposition. For instance, you are either for human rights or you're not for human rights. You don't have to be AGAINST human rights necessarily to not be for them. Politicians are not political activists. A political activist's interest is the success of a point of view. A politician's is not. There comes a point where a political activist, which I believe all worthwhile politicians begin as, cease to be an activist for an issue and begin to be a politician whose focus is politicking. There are of course politicians from different lines of work, particularly corporate America, but that plague is best left for discussion at a different time. The crux of the difference between an activist and a politician is flexibility. Activists are inflexible on their positions. Politicians are born o...