PILOT SPIN
Spin Zone => Spin Zone => Topic started by: JeffDG on March 14, 2016, 12:30:58 PM
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First off...none of this is for 2016. So, let's discuss this without any mudslinging about current candidates on either side of the aisle. I've been thinking that the current system for primaries is a shit-show for some time, but what could be done to fix it? Well, here's my modest proposal (with apologies to Jonathan Swift)
1. Delegates per Territory
I have no flipping clue how they determine how many delegates Florida gets, or Tennessee, or anywhere else. That said, I would suggest matching delegates to Electors by some fixed multiplier. Let's say 5 for the sake of argument. So, Montana receives 15 electors, and California receives 275 (55*5). Since the selection is for the Presidential candidate, it makes sense to use the same metric as the Presidential election uses.
2. Method of voting
OK, let's ditch the whole primary v. caucus and all that crap, and just use one way to vote nationwide. My proposal would be an "Instant Runoff" Ranked Ballot (this is important later...stand by), by which the voter ranks their candidates from 1 through however many candidates there are.
3. Award of Delegates
No more some states are Winner-take-all v. Proportional v. Some godforaken method nobody understands methods. All delegates in the state would go to the candidate who receives a majority of votes based on an instant-run-off system.
So...if you have A, B and C running, for 1st Place Choices, A recieves 40%, B receives 35% and C receives 25%. "C" is dropped and his 25% of votes go to their second place choices, and A receives 12% and B receives 13%. Now A has 52% vs 48% for B, so A gets the delegates. On the other hand, if A received only 8% and B received 17% of C's votes, then B would win 52/48.
No back-room deals, all decided by the voters and their preferences.
To map this to this year, if in your heart-of-hearts, you thought Pataki would have been the best candidate, you could rank him #1, safe in the knowledge that your vote was not wasted, because when he was dropped off, your second place vote would be counted.
4. "Convention" Votes
To continue in the vein of the voters retain control, the ballots would be retained until he convention. If one candidate did not receive the majority of votes on the first ballot at the convention, then the bottom candidate in convention votes would be dropped and the votes in that state recounted with that person removed (ie. their first place votes would be redistributed etc.) to decide who would receive the votes from that state.
Each round of voting would go the same way, with the bottom candidate being dropped and everything recalculated. Eventually, it would boil down to 2 candidates and one would receive a majority.
Again, no back-room deals, voters would remain in full and complete control.
Conclusion
This is the only way I can think of to keep the voters in control and the back room dealers out of the mix. Comments and feedback welcomed!
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I kind of like the idea of the list of preferences but as you know so many things can transpire from an initial vote in a primary months prior to the convention that it may not actually do any more for determining a 'will of the people' outcome than the original 'snapshot in time' that was the primary.
The issue with the primaries and the convention is that they are Party functions and while I believe the Republican approach is far more representative of the will of the people than the confusing superdelegate approach used by the Democrats, I do believe it is up to the respective Party to figure out how they want to go forward.
It would be interesting to suggest this up to the RNC and DNC and see what their response is.
Interesting idea JeffDG.
'Gimp
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wouldn't a problem with this be:
Why should anyone else but the <name of party> party members determine who they select as their nominee?
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wouldn't a problem with this be:
Why should anyone else but the <name of party> party members determine who they select as their nominee?
The way I'm interpreting this, the top person from each party would be the nominee. Right? However, the problem of recording all people voted for could be problematic.
Say I vote for acrogimp and nobody else does. That still has to be recorded somehow, and tallied. Possible with technology, of course, but realistically, you could have thousands of names voted for.
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I'm not a big fan of early voting or releasing early voting results. No results should be released until all voting is over at the very least.
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wouldn't a problem with this be:
Why should anyone else but the <name of party> party members determine who they select as their nominee?
Oh...yeah.
All primaries are "closed". You need to declare that you support the principles of the party at some point before the primary (30 days, maybe longer) in order to be eligible to vote therein.
If you don't want to declare as a member of the R's or D's, fine, but you don't get to decide who their nominee is.
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How about this? Let California go first so I can finally have say!! >:(
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How about this? Let California go first so I can finally have say!! >:(
but that would include the la la land loonies
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Here's an interesting proposal that is dated well before the current debacle. Has a good look at the history of the primary system.
http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/a-republican-nomination-process