• flandish@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    the key here is “proper primary.” I can’t remember a time when they’ve had one that wasn’t fucked up in some way.

      • flandish@lemmy.world
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        5 hours ago

        neat. i have been voting for longer than that. there have been years where there was only one person on the primary, which efficiently means “primary votes are cancelled” - when the dnc say they want the incumbent.

        that is a de facto cancellation. telling the people who could vote that they are ignored.

        my point stands: the dem side needs to do a better job.

        • 13igTyme@piefed.social
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          4 hours ago

          I’ve been voting since I was 18 and I’ve never seen that in the past 16 years. 2024 was skipping because Biden was the incumbent at the time. Incumbent are almost always given the primary. The GOP does the same and is entirely different.

          • flandish@lemmy.world
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            4 hours ago

            yeah. see. i disagree that incumbents should be given anything. earn it. primary every time.

            i have been voting since 1997.

            • FudgyMcTubbs@lemmy.world
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              3 hours ago

              I agree with you, but as devil’s advocate, why would a political party vie against itself for a seat it already holds. At best, it would only slightly sully the incumbent’s name. Take Biden for example: either he’s doing a good job, or he needs to be replaced because he’s not doing a good enough job.

              • DaMummy@hilariouschaos.com
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                2 hours ago

                So primaries are only so politicians can choose their voters, and not the other way around? I was told only MAGAts are the cultist?

              • flandish@lemmy.world
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                3 hours ago

                why? because its supposed to represent the current situation and overton window not be a reminder the parties are “clubs” that set their own rules.

      • butwhyishischinabook@piefed.social
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        3 hours ago

        That’s absolutely not true. I’ve been voting since 2012 and the only presidential primary I’ve voted in that had more than one candidate was the Hillary-Bernie primary. That’s the only one.

        • 13igTyme@piefed.social
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          1 hour ago

          It absolutely is true. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries

          In 2012 Obama was the incumbent, which again as I mentioned, incumbents typically aren’t primaried if they are doing a decent job and up for re-election.

          Since then there was 2016, 2020, where both years had a primary for the DNC. 2024 was just a fluke because Biden should have dropped out. Or even stuck with his original campaign promise of not running for re-election.

          • butwhyishischinabook@piefed.social
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            1 hour ago

            Depending on your state. In mine, there was a single candidate. That’s a primary in the same way the USSR had elections. If you lived in one of the states that had two candidates in 2020 then good for you. I didn’t.

      • Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone
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        7 hours ago
        1. They were NOT expecting Obama to oust Hillary, and took steps to make sure something like that doesn’t happen again. Allegedly the new DNC head or whatever his title is wants fair primaries, so I guess we’ll see.
          • Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone
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            7 hours ago

            As far as I know/remember it was, at least as fair as any primary with superdelegates can be. Or rather, it was still using an unfair system and enough people turned out so that the system to keep nominations “in check” didn’t work.

            • Optional@lemmy.world
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              6 hours ago

              Cynthia McKinney was elected as a Democrat in Georgia around that time. iirc she was looking at a presidential run. You might have seen her on here yesterday for her latest tweet. (Spoiler: super bigot)

              Which is to say, if you open the field to everyone in the country you will spend a certain amount of time winnowing the contenders from the stunt candidates. Republicans don’t do that because they’re all the same candidate. So they spend almost zero time (since Perot) dealing with that.

              Superdelegates aren’t great, but an alternative to achieve that aim of not having to platform every trust fund kid with a boot on their head might be good.

              • Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone
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                6 hours ago

                She ran as a Green Party candidate, not a Democratic one. I’m not sure how she’s relevant?

                She was pretty suspect even in 2008, so I’m not sure I buy that if we don’t have superdelegates and let voters decide who the candidates are, then the stupid masses will just pick whoever.

                • Optional@lemmy.world
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                  37 minutes ago

                  Oh man you’re right I’d forgotten that.

                  I don’t think superdelegates are to prevent popular candidates (see Obama), I think they’re to get a comprehensible slate of candidates to focus on issues and themes and not on turning the Iowa caucus into something bizarre by claiming to be a Democrat who just happens to demand we all live in the sea or something.

                  Again, republicans don’t have this problem, and they’re well known to fund ‘spoiler candidates’ with the intention of wrecking momentum or message or other campaign aspects.

      • LovingHippieCat@lemmy.world
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        6 hours ago

        Even 2016 was pretty fair. The nomination went to the person with the most votes and the majority of the non-super delegates. Bernie lost because people didn’t want to vote for him because of a variety of reasons but not because the primary wasn’t “fair”. If more people voted for him he would have won.

        • crusa187@lemmy.ml
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          5 hours ago

          No, Bernie had the nom stolen by Hillary and DWS via corrupt back room dealings and superdelegate shenanigans. Everyone was voting Bernie and for the corporate elite that was a problem. They solved it by ratfucking the primaries, a tried and true dem tactic.

          • LovingHippieCat@lemmy.world
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            5 hours ago

            Ah yes, super delegate shenanigans like the majority going to the candidate who had over 3 million more votes than the other. The only way Bernie could have won with super delegates is if he got almost all of them. And if he did then the candidate who got 3 million less votes would have won the nomination and we would still be facing people saying the democratic primaries aren’t “fair”.

            Now don’t get me wrong, DWS was biased as fuck. But if the voters simply turned out and voted for Bernie then bias wouldn’t have mattered. The RNC was biased towards Jeb bush and Ted Cruz but you know how that turned out.

            • DaMummy@hilariouschaos.com
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              2 hours ago

              In the 2016 WV Democrat Primary, Bernie won every single county, 40k more votes than Clinton, but Clinton won the state. Your math isn’t mathing.

              • LovingHippieCat@lemmy.world
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                1 hour ago

                Nope Bernie won the state. He won and got 18 delegates and Clinton got 11. But then at the convention Clinton got the 8 super delegates from the state which put her at 19 delegates to Bernie’s 18 but Bernie still won the state. Here’s my source.

        • Optional@lemmy.world
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          6 hours ago

          Bernie lost because people didn’t want to vote for him because of a variety of reasons but not because the primary wasn’t “fair”. If more people voted for him he would have won.

          Uh oh

          (I agree, although DWS really screwed up everything including discussing this)

          • LovingHippieCat@lemmy.world
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            5 hours ago

            Yeah this is something that really bothers me about my fellow leftists and is pure revisionism about the 2016 primary. Bernie lost fair and square and all we had to do to make sure that didn’t happen was get more people to vote for him. But according to many people on here if the candidate fails to win then it’s their sole fault because they couldn’t convince voters to go with them. But I guess that doesn’t apply to Bernie.

            Also I hate how DWS screwed up talking about this all because she was biased as fuck towards Clinton. Her bias wouldn’t have mattered if more people had voted for Bernie but her having a bias at all must mean Bernie was cheated out of the nomination.

            • DaMummy@hilariouschaos.com
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              2 hours ago

              Does this mean if Trump enforces voting via Real ID, and millions of people get removed from their right to vote, and Trump wins in '28, that more people should have voted for Democrats or that Trump shouldn’t have purged the voter rolls of as many people as possible that wouldn’t vote for him?