Sunday, July 25, 2004
News: Republicans campaigning to put Kerry on ballots
Original Article
After the last presidential election, which was so narrowly decided in favor of Bush that the Supreme Court basically decided the election, yet if it weren't for the fact that if Nader hadn't split the liberal vote due to one of those typical futile third-party efforts the presidency would certainly have gone to Gore without contest, we're seeing a rather cynical ploy on behalf of some Republican groups: conservatives campaigning to put Nader on the ballet in some states.
Yeah, it sounds a bit iffish just out of the blue like that, "C'mon now, would they really be so cynical to play such numbers games?" Well maybe I'd agree with you, except if you go to page two of the above-linked article, the CEO of one such organization outright admits to doing it, almost seeming pleased with his own cleverness?
Why does this happen? Simply, it's because some people are more concerned with getting "my guy" in, than trying to discover the true will of the American people. There's no law against campaigning for someone with diametrically-opposed views, true, and I'd rather not see one passed. But it does illustrate what an atmosphere of gamesmanship has arisen in our political process.
And due to the particular mathematics of our electoral system that greatly favors a two-party system, combined with the incredible inertia against any changes whatsoever to the mechanics of our political process (because whoever wins would naturally be reluctant to change the procedure that granted them power, in case another chocolate bar falls out of the machine), I figure this kind of thing will only get worse.
In other news, blog posts are still extremely infrequent at the moment due to continuing job search. I'm getting really frustrated with it all.
Original Article
After the last presidential election, which was so narrowly decided in favor of Bush that the Supreme Court basically decided the election, yet if it weren't for the fact that if Nader hadn't split the liberal vote due to one of those typical futile third-party efforts the presidency would certainly have gone to Gore without contest, we're seeing a rather cynical ploy on behalf of some Republican groups: conservatives campaigning to put Nader on the ballet in some states.
Yeah, it sounds a bit iffish just out of the blue like that, "C'mon now, would they really be so cynical to play such numbers games?" Well maybe I'd agree with you, except if you go to page two of the above-linked article, the CEO of one such organization outright admits to doing it, almost seeming pleased with his own cleverness?
Why does this happen? Simply, it's because some people are more concerned with getting "my guy" in, than trying to discover the true will of the American people. There's no law against campaigning for someone with diametrically-opposed views, true, and I'd rather not see one passed. But it does illustrate what an atmosphere of gamesmanship has arisen in our political process.
And due to the particular mathematics of our electoral system that greatly favors a two-party system, combined with the incredible inertia against any changes whatsoever to the mechanics of our political process (because whoever wins would naturally be reluctant to change the procedure that granted them power, in case another chocolate bar falls out of the machine), I figure this kind of thing will only get worse.
In other news, blog posts are still extremely infrequent at the moment due to continuing job search. I'm getting really frustrated with it all.
