Friar Bijou wrote:
Couple of points:
1. You are not likely to ever see that clip since, as I clearly stated in the post, there, it was a radio show. Learn to fucking read.
Um... Ok. Distinction without a difference. I didn't "hear" the clip. Not sure how that changes my assessment one bit though.
Quote:
2. If you are in agreement with his guest that the run-of-the-mill party member need have no say in the primary process, just say so.
Lol. You're channeling Bill O'Reilly now. I'm saying that your assumption is wrong. You get that you just did exactly what I was laughing about dumb journalists doing, right?
Your problem, just as O'Reilly's was, is that you assume that the only "say" a run of the mill member of the party has is when they vote in a statewide primary. Any run of the mill member of the party was free to attend the GOP CO convention, have his say, participate in selecting delegates, etc. He just had to actually choose to do that. Those who showed up and participated got to have a voice. I'm not sure why you think this is unfair.
Your conclusion that the absence of a primary style vote disenfranchised "the people" is based on the assumption that this was the only way they could have a voice in the outcome. Your assumption is wrong. Ergo, your conclusion is wrong. Get it?
Your argument is like saying that the voters have no "say" in laws passed by our legislators, because we don't get to vote directly on the legislation. But we do vote for the legislators. That's our "say" in the process. Same deal here. You go to a caucus in your local county (or whatever geographical region is involved), and vote for your county delegates. Those delegates then go to the state convention and vote for the state delegates that will ultimately be sent to the national convention (and will in turn vote for a nominee). This is how this process works. And there's nothing at all "wrong" or "rigged" about it. It's a very common system that we use all the time for any of a number of different political decisions.
If you think it's wrong to do it that way, then you should also think it's wrong that we use delegates at all. We should just have one big election held nationwide on the first day of the convention (or second, so we can give the candidates a day to give speeches or whatever), and then count up the votes and assign a winner. Why don't we do that? Answer that question, and you'll have also answered why Colorado uses the system they use. Because... It's the same reason. And again, there's nothing at all wrong with it.
Trump's problem is that he doesn't think in terms of delegates actually being people. They're just numbers on a ledger that he needs to accumulate to win. He does poorly in caucus states precisely because they are designed to require the candidate to actually spend time with "the people" and winning their support rather than just showing up at arena size events and giving speeches to try to win votes, before zipping off in a limo to a plane to travel to the next state. And frankly, I have no problem with states requiring candidates who want to win their support actually spending time talking to, and getting to know the people in that state first. And honestly, if he really influenced enough people with his speeches and drive by events, then those people could easily have flocked to their local caucuses, and voted in delegates who would support Trump, who then would have showed up at the state convention in mass numbers, and put their people (his people) in the state delegation. And then he's have "won" the delegates from that state.
He didn't bother to do that. It's unclear if he just didn't understand the process (I suspect that's part of it), or he didn't care to spend that much effort for that number of delegates, but it was ultimately his decision to make. Complaining about it after the fact is childish. Others jumping in to also declare the system "unfair" when they clearly also don't seem to understand the facts is just piling stupidity on top of stupidity. And again, what's so funny about this is that in the last week or so, I've probably seen a half dozen different guests on various shows explain how the system in Colorado works, why it's set up that way, and why it's not unfair at all, only to have the journalists just ignore what they say and repeat the allegation that it's all just so unfair. It's quite clear that the narrative is set, and the journalist's job is to just repeat that narrative over and over. And what's really interesting is that this narrative is operating across all of the news outlets. Doesn't matter if it's Fox, MSNBC, or CNN. They're all doing the same thing. And no, I don't think it's a political slant thing at all. I think it's a "outrage generates media hits" thing. It's only "news" if it appears to be something wrong. If there's "nothing to see here", they lose the story. So it's totally in their interests to hype up the false assumption.
And it's obviously working on enough people.