Slashdot Mirror
Democrats Crowdsourcing To Vote Palin In Primaries
SharpieMarker writes "In what could be the most extreme and influential crowdsourcing project ever, Democrats are beginning to organize to purposely vote for Palin in the 2012 Republican primaries. Their theory is by having Palin as an opponent, Obama will have the best odds at winning reelection. Recent polls have shown that Obama comfortably leads Palin by 10-20 points, but Obama is statistically tied with Romney and barely ahead of Huckabee. They even have a state-by-state primary voting guide to help Democrats navigate various states' rules for voting Palin in Republican primaries."
I'm not sure if I can support this. I think it perverts the process.
What could possibly go wrong?
I thought it was rather embarrassing for the republicans when they tried these tactics against Obama. It saddens me that apparently some democrats are sinking to their level. Really, I can't imagine this being successful anyway.
This is dangerous. Jimmy Carter wanted to run against Ronald Reagan - 1 to 2 years out he was seen as the easiest to beat. Alas, didn't turn out that way.
... is that elections are largely driven by economic fundamentals and (to some degree) random chance. Meaning, there's a non-trivial probability that Palin might beat Obama. I'm not trying to be an ass about Palin, because I'm sure she's a nice person in the right context, but she has not demonstrated anything close to the knowledge and/or responsibility that I would expect in a Presidential candidate. She doesn't appear to have taken the lessons offered by the '08 election in terms of becoming more informed or dedicated --- all she seems to have learned is that she can get traction by attacking anything remotely related to the left wing. That's great for a pundit, not so great for the President of a large country.
In the long run a Palin presidency would be a disaster for Democrats and Republicans, not to mention Americans in general. These people shouldn't flirt with disaster.
The Nazis decided that if their plans weren't realistic, reality would have to budge.
Not saying (not even implying, hi there FoxNews) that Palin's a Nazi, will create a totalitarian state of some kind or other. I am saying that candidate Palin could become president Palin and Democrats would have noone but themselves to blame.
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
Seems like a terribly bad idea to me. (1) It corrupts the US election process, because that's not how it was supposed to work. (2) It legitimizes non-democratic measures to counter this. (3) It increases the odds that Sara Palin becomes President. On the plus side, it does show a rather touching confidence in the common sense of the US voter (that, sadly, I cannot share).
As a european my most direct concern is (3), because having an airhead as the leader of a large and powerful nation is bad for the whole world, but (1) and (2) are painful to watch too. To use a car analogy: of course my neighbor is free to use a sledgehammer on his own car, but it's still painful to watch.
President Palin.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
This will just lead to more state parties moving to closed primaries. This means independents, most Americans, will have even less say in who our leaders are.
The 20% of the population who are hardcore partisan douchebags like these make me sick. What we need is a process that let's the other 80% of the population - most of who are so disgusted by this that they don't even vote - have more say, not less.
Isn't it a little early to call something like this "the most extreme and influential crowdsourcing"? Not that it's the end-all metric of popularity, but it has 16 follows so far 25 facebook likes for god's sake. Slow down a bit before you hurt yourself.
Not sure who he was, but it's made me recast these kinds of things in a different light.