this post was submitted on 14 Sep 2024
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Primary elections are how parties change. Primary elections are how the Republican party became what it is today. They are often the highest-leverage vote you can cast if you're in a solid district.
Yup. People don't realize there is already a not horrible approximation of runoff voting that still avoids the spoiler effect.
And just look at what happened when Sanders realized that. He went from being a meme about how nobody watches C-SPAN to one of the more influential politicians on the Left.
Well I'd say it's still pretty bad with the super delegates and such. But yeah it's runoff system of sorts and people should pay more attention to it.
But a lot of the "system is broken" angst comes from people being not happy over who the majority of people vote for. But that's just democracy, baby.
But the Electoral College, yeah that shit is broken.
Primaries are still subject to spoiler effects and such.
In my very blue state this year where the top two in the primary go on to the general, there was a local position which had a whole bunch of well qualified Democrats vs just a couple of Republicans. (Incumbent not running)
The dem vote was split enough that we very nearly had just the two Republicans in the general. Like less than 60 votes away.
And there are scenarios under runoff voting where similar can occur (e.g. two seats, 2 right wing, 4 left wing) and is where the "election theory" aspect of things that certain folk are still bitching about (because that is the most important thing to have happened in the past 8 years, clearly). The party needs to take the results of the primary and downselect who actually runs to avoid splitting their own vote.
No voting system is perfect. But people should really understand what we have and what their NEED improves and fails to improve rather than just insisting "new is better".
Remind me who won in 2016? How do you think all those Bernie supporters felt about the election that was still very much influenced by FPTP dynamics.
Primary elections aren’t democratic either (see party delegates). I feel like people who say this are rarely politically engaged in their communities. Same with the people who say to get involved in local city politics to make change.
Ultimately you’re supporting a facist system that is historically atrocious and currently financially supporting a genocide almost singlehandedly but go ahead and keep telling people that the best way to maintain some semblance of moral character is to vote in this sham.
Too bad the dems skipped the primary and just anointed their candidate.