News of the Day

[pete]

The Mitt Romney-Rick Santorum Michigan primary results just got a little more contentious.

Michigan’s two at-large delegates to the Republican National convention will be awarded to Michigan native Mitt Romney, following a vote last night by the state party’s credentials’ committee.

The vote came despite the party’s rules that the two at-large delegates are supposed to be awarded on a proportional basis based on the statewide popular vote. Romney won the statewide vote by a 41% to 38% margin over former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum.

http://www.freep.com/article/2012030...arge-delegates

That's pretty shitty and incredibly unfair. Why not just dispense with pretending the GOP nomination process really has anything to do with the will of the rank-and-file and just let the kingmakers pick Romney now?

That's the kind of crap that can lead to a full scale political revolution inside a party in this day and age of new media.

What is so unfair?

In February they agreed that each district would get 2 votes, there are 14 districts. Then there would be 2 at large delegates that would go to the one with the most votes. Some idiot sent out a memo that said other wise and even before the election the Michigan GOP said the memo was false and should not had been sent.

Each candidate wins 7 districts, thus each got 14 delegates. Romney got the most votes and thus won the other 2.

From the Port Huron Times Herald:

The Michigan Republican Party Credentials Committee voted 4-2 Wednesday night, however, to reaffirm a rule it passed Feb. 4 giving both delegates to the winner of the statewide vote — in this case, Romney. It said a memo explaining the rule wrongly noted that the at-large delegates would be awarded proportionally.

I know every news broadcast that I watched Tuesday night after the game, CNN, MCNBC and Fox, all said the winner of the vote would get the 2 extra delegates.

I just wish these states would stop these open primaries. The polling in Michigan showed that 10% of those voting were democrats and something like 58% admitted to voting for Santorum as they think Romney will be harder to defeat in November.

If Michigan was a closed primary state Romney would had a much larger percentage of the vote.

7 of the next 10 states are also open to all and the unions are asking their democrat members to vote for Santorum.


Some may not think this is wrong, open primaries, but wait until the shoe is on the other foot.

[Flycoon]

Originally Posted by WaiverWire

Some may not think this is wrong, open primaries, but wait until the shoe is on the other foot.

If you don't think Republicans voted for "that black guy" in the last cycle because they thought he would be easier to defeat than Hillary......

So you are saying only registered Republicans should vote in primaries? I will go along with that if only registered Republicans are allowed to vote Republican in the general election.

[Donnie D]

Closed primaries are total horse shit. Everyone should get to vote to select candidates including independents.

The only reason this is a problem is because everyone is having separate presidential primaries so early at an additional cost to the tax payers If they would conduct the presidential primary at the same time as other offices, they wouldn't have cross over voting.

That's a better solution than trying to keep voters out of the process.

Originally Posted by Donnie D

Closed primaries are total horse shit. Everyone should get to vote to select candidates including independents.

The only reason this is a problem is because everyone is having separate presidential primaries so early at an additional cost to the tax payers If they would conduct the presidential primary at the same time as other offices, they wouldn't have cross over voting.

That's a better solution than trying to keep voters out of the process.

Your so off base I'm laughing. The primaries are for all the parties to select their candidates. If a party is not running someone then what gives them the right to vote? A general election is for anyone to vote for their candidate, no matter what party they represent.

Once again you have to revert to history. Who cares. Just because it was done in the past does not make it right.

Under your logic even though I live in the county I should be able to vote for the mayor Tampa because my mailing address makes one believe I am in Tampa. Better yet you get a vote for a union president when you don't belong to a union.

And Donnie, next time you have an office meeting and there is a vote, please let me know as I would like to vote if one is asked.

Originally Posted by Flycoon

If you don't think Republicans voted for "that black guy" in the last cycle because they thought he would be easier to defeat than Hillary......

So you are saying only registered Republicans should vote in primaries? I will go along with that if only registered Republicans are allowed to vote Republican in the general election.

And that was not right. Again in the past. And in 2008 both parties were running so I do not think it was as big as an issue. In Michigan 10% of the voters admitted they were democrat and voted for Santorum as this would give Obama a better chance.

A primary is to select the person you most want to see as the president. It is not for an opposing party to help select a Candide they think their party leader can defeat. None of these democrat voters were selected to be a delegate and none will be in Tampa based on their party affiliation. So why let them cross vote?

In Michigan there were 997,172 votes cast. If the polls are correct 10% of the voters, or 99,717 were democrat. Of that total 58% or 57,836 admitted they were voting for Santorum because they were told by their union leaders that Santorum could not defeat Obama and wanted to discredit Romney. This gives Santorum a vote total less than 320,000 and not as impressive as one would think.

[Hoek]

Primaries should be open if in the general election one party is running unopposed, other than that though, I dunno.

Originally Posted by Hoek

Primaries should be open if in the general election one party is running unopposed, other than that though, I dunno.

Could not disagree more. Then why not just have an open election after open election and narrow it down until one person gets 50%+1 and they would then win.

Here we go again, round two. More tornadoes touching down in northern Alabama and heading toward Tennessee.


http://www.foxnews.com/


http://www.cnn.com/2012/03/02/us/sev...html?hpt=hp_t1

[Hoek]

Not sure where you got that from.